Crux

80 BRAVE GIRL

Saturday November 3rd

Ling cried for hours. She had never been so frightened in her life. Not even when her mommy’s body had died. Not even when they’d shut her off from her mommy and she’d been alone for the first time. She’d been sure it would end soon, that she’d have her mommy back and not be alone any more…

But now they were going to kill her mommy. Kill her dead, the way that humans died. She tried to reach out her mind for Feng again, for Kade again.

FENG! FENG, PLEASE! FENG, HELP ME!

Nothing.

KADE! KADE, I NEED YOU! KADE, PLEASE!

Nothing, nothing, nothing.

Ling was alone. And only she could stop the humans from killing her mommy.

She cried curled up in a ball, the ampule and injector from the freezer clutched in her hands. She cried as softly as she could, so her father wouldn’t hear, so he wouldn’t know that she knew.

She watched her father in the house monitors. He was asleep, his breathing slow and regular. In just hours he would rise to murder her mother. Unless she did this. Did it now.

Ling Shu rose. She wiped her face with her dress, did her best to stop her sniffles. She was a posthuman. Maybe the only posthuman if her mother died. She had to be brave. She had to do the right thing.

The house opened the door to her mother’s room for her, and Ling crept out, slowly, quietly. Outside the floor to ceiling windows of the penthouse, Shanghai was alive with light, a city pretending that nothing had ever happened to it. The electronic face of Zhi Li stared at her, a thousand times larger than life, ruby lips smiling, green eyes winking. Ling hated her then. Hated her with a fury that she had to struggle to keep in check.

Ling took a deep breath, then a tiny step, then another, and another, illuminated only by the light of the city and Zhi Li’s porcelain glow, until she stood before her father’s door, the injector in her hand.

The door was locked, the apartment told her. He locked it every night when he retired to his room. But this apartment was hers, not his. Ling reached out with her thoughts, and the door unlocked itself for her with a quiet snick.

She held her breath then, waited, watched her father through the cameras in his room. He didn’t stir. He breathed deeply and slowly.

Ling reached out with her thoughts again. The door opened for her, and Ling stepped into her father’s room.