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  My heart drums, as though it might leap from my chest.

  Whoever it is stays for long minutes where the only sound is the soft draw and exhale of their breath. I reach my senses toward them, greeting the water in their body like an old friend. Male. Eager. Not enough electrolytes. Thirsty. May doesn’t stir, and I let my mind drift into his cells. If he grabs for May . . . I fight back the urge to open my eyes and see the face of the man who dares to watch us. Has he seen the blue?

  Impossible, my mind tells me. I’ve taken the effort to hide beneath the soil. Eventually, after what feels like a lifetime, his footsteps retreat over to our wagon. The soft crinkle of paper and clank of metal tells me he’s hunting for Maybelle’s water canister.

  The boy’s father, perhaps?

  I still don’t open my eyes. The fault lands squarely on my shoulders, and I worry at my bottom lip. I didn’t help the last time by refilling her canister without checking the boy might be watching.

  What will happen if someone steals her canister? I’ll have nothing to fill up again. What will I do then? My heart pounds at the thought of my sister going without when I have the ability to ease her thirst. I force my lungs to take in air in slow, rhythmic breaths. Sucking in little bits at a time no matter how much my lungs burn. Then the footsteps fade into nothing, and my chest aches with the need to suck in oxygen, but I can’t. Not yet. The sound will be too loud in the silence.

  The pressurised energy roils and bubbles beneath my skin, becoming an itch so bad my gums swell. Sure that the man has left, I release the energy again, and it flares into the soil, sharp as lightning toward the aquifer. The edge bites, and I moan, fighting back a cry of pain. I purse my lips, breathing out slow, then press my mouth into May’s shoulder to silence any sound.

  In. Out. Again, I breathe through my nose. Tears trickle down my face, dampening May’s thin dress. My fingers sizzle, but I urge the deeper parts of the confined aquifer past the impermeable rock to the surface.

  Hopefully, I can make an artesian well just at the start of the hills, and give the Old Order followers a new place to resettle.

  The water seeps up to me, and my arm numbs. That’s what I get for trying to hold it back. My face fills with electric points of ice, then I open my eyes, and the stars blur at the edges, becoming a bright haze. Cold air flows into my lungs. Over there; I direct the water up a downward grade and not too far away between the hills. Groundwater rushes to the surface, and I tuck my chin to my chest, groaning.

  Sweat drips from my forehead, chilling in the desert breeze. When the density sits at the surface of the land, it feels like my cells drain of their essence, and I slump against the blanket. I withdraw my hand from the soil, and the soft raze of my thumb along my nails confirms them as ragged shreds.

  I lean into my little sister, finding comfort in the way my hand presses over the top of hers.

  The Old Order followers will think the water in the distance is a mirage. When they discover it isn’t, hopefully they’re too happy to ask questions.

  Chapter Three

  Blood-curdling screams pierce my sleep.

  I jerk awake, reaching out for my little sister, but I can’t find her beside me. “May, it’s okay. Come closer to me.” Consciousness kicks in at once with desert warmth hot on its heels. “It’s only a nightmare,” I try to soothe her while rubbing my eyes. “No one’s here who can hurt you, bub. Remember, we’re not in there anymore.”

  She often wakes up screaming at odd times of the night or early morning, suffering from nightmares. I take a shallow breath of Oshiro’s dry air, rolling taut points of my body from last night’s water-healing.

  The sun-baked ground warms the coarse blanket under my hands. The day seems too hot to do anything but find a shady spot. However, I can’t see the Old Order followers delaying once they discover the water. A thumping pain squeezes my right temple, but I roll toward my little sister and then pat the blanket once, twice. She’s not there at all.

  I open my gritty eyes and shout, “May!” while getting to my feet, disorientated.

  Dry winds blow the scent of dirt, dust, and horseflesh across the ground, making it difficult to breathe. I can’t properly make out what I’m seeing, but the wagon train is in an uproar, and I squint against the light.

  Scouts break through the circle to the centre in a sharp line, and their horses’ hooves kick up even more dust. A spray of tiny rocks spatter my skirt, stinging my skin. I cough, wiping my mouth with my fist as I turn away.

  In the drifting clouds, the wagon master shouts orders to the scouts, lifts his rifle to the sky, aims, and then fires. A shockwave of sound explodes from the sky, and my ears burn. The sound isn’t from the guns but something else. Warm wetness pools in the shells, dripping from my lobes to my neck. Frantic women grab their screaming children, dragging them into the wagons, trying to calm the horses enough to drive away.

  Blood drips from my nose. “May?” I call shrilly, looking around, but the images around me don’t hold, and my head wobbles. Tightness squeezes my chest. My stomach sits in my mouth. “Where are you?”

  She emerges from the dust cloud on my left, her hair bedraggled, pink dress filthy and ripped, but thankfully all in one piece. Her lips move. She must be talking, but a high-pitched whine rings in my ears.

  I shake my head, point to my ears, reaching for her the same time she grabs my shoulders. “Are you okay?” I ask, although I can’t hear myself speak. “What’s going on?”

  She keeps talking and shakes me so hard; I have to hang on to her skinny hips. “Tori, I’m scared. Wake up. They’re here. Get up. They found us.” Finally her voice breaks through, and the desperation on her face shatters my heart.

  I go to grab her hand just as a huge black shadow sweeps across the cracked ground and blocks out the sun. I stiffen, looking up at the object, but hot wind sweeps down, and I lift my arm to shield my face. The blanket flies up, drifting away. Fine grit needles my skin and dress. Another jet of hot air blasts us. In horror, I let my gaze follow the sharp ridges along the underside of the dark grey ship. A slow electrical charge hums in the space, vibrating atoms in the air. The craft’s pointed front end slices through the blue sky, like a menacing blade with sunlight a liquid line at its edges.

  “On three!” the wagon master hollers. The scouts lift their rifles to the sky. “One, two, three.” Numerous gunshots explode. An acute ringing fills in my ears, and I crash to my knees.

  My hair uncoils, tumbling across my shoulders. “May!” I scream in a hoarse voice over the sound of women, children, and the scouts’ gunshots. A strange, fierce trembling invades my limbs. “We have to outrun them, or their sound defence will kill us.”

  I push through the pain, sweep May off her feet, sprinting into another dust cloud toward our horses, but my legs feel all disjointed and funny. I’m still in the grip of the ship’s sound defence and can’t seem to get my bearings or make it to the wagon’s stay chains and stretcher to free the horses.

  Scouts fire, and another boom explodes in the air. I land on my knees. Pain flares up my kneecaps and my hips, and then Maybelle tumbles out of my arms. The next sonic boom is louder, and I clap my hands over my ears, groaning. Tears streak through the grime coating May’s face, and she bends over, crying.

  The sounds arc in a repeating loop. Blood drips from my nose onto the dirt. Maybelle lies on her side in a ball. The sound paralyses our bodies, but the horses rear back and kick their front legs, tossing off riders to bolt into the empty desert.

  Finally, the sounds die.

  The crushing ache vanishes in my head, and I crawl toward May, pressing her tiny body against mine as we breathe in dirt particles. My heart races so fast I want to be sick. Blood coats my hands, and my stomach cramps from hunger pains. I haven’t eaten in five days, but I slide an arm under May’s knees and arms, finding the strength to carry her.

  “Victoria Undine,” a metallic voice bellows from the ship’s public address system. “This is the actin
g president of the Oshiro Country government. You are hereby ordered to surrender immediately. If you choose not to do so, we will be compelled to use extreme force.”

  Like I am a desert fly they forgot to squash. “May,” I cry, pressing my lips against her cheek. “They’ll keep using the sound if I don’t go. Find another wagon. Go with Angie, the woman who helped us. They won’t hurt you. There’s water at the start of the hills.”

  “No.” May shakes her head frantically, pressing both knees to her chin, her arms wrapped around her legs. “No, I want to stay with you,” she pleads. “Tori, don’t leave me.”

  “They said my name. Not yours.” When she doesn’t move, the tone of my voice changes, brooking no disagreement. “You have a chance to get out of here. Get up right now, and run over to one of the other women.”

  “I’ll never see you again.” Her tone is pitiful, eyes hurt.

  “If they . . . captured you again, the blue could . . . destroy everyone but me.”

  Her round, blue-grey eyes meet mine. Her skin is so red, blood trickles from her nostrils and eyes. “Okay.” She nods. Her fingers release me slowly even though they’re sweaty. “Okay.”

  “Hang on. Once more before you go.” I let the energy flare out, licks of blue encompassing my body. I bridge the gap to flush her tiny frame with water, careful to rehydrate her in a measured way. I don’t need to hide anymore. The last glimpse of my beloved sister isn’t of her face, but her brain and kidneys. The echoing thump of her small heart.

  Hydration ends in thirty-six hours.

  “You’re ready. Go.” I swallow back my tears, and she stands, then turns, sprinting toward a group of women and children.

  I breathe out my relief and trek in a numb fashion into a clearing outside the wagon train circle, waving my arms high and wide.

  “Here I am!” I yell at the government’s ship.

  The craft hovers to the right, vectors thrusting hot air, and the temperature curls the fly-away hairs on my forehead. The elongated ship lands with a high-pitched scream of machinery, and then the front dock opens with a metallic hiss. Desert air sweeps dirt clouds down the sides. As the metal door lowers, soldiers dressed in dark blue uniforms and helmets march into view.

  Their steps from the starship mimic the pounding of my heart. I grip my walking skirt, wiping sweat from my palms, and think up a diversion. Something strong enough so they won’t go after Maybelle. I lift my hand, and my black, shredded nails stretch toward the soldiers who form an arrow toward me. The last shipment of weaponry the previous president exchanged for my services to Civ 6 is in their hands. Laser guns—the type that can burn flesh in an instant.

  That’s fine. I push the energy to my feet, and a roar of power sweeps over me from my tiptoes to my head. My body erupts into blue, moving across my skin in a rippling aura.

  Horses neigh and then shouts come from behind me, and I turn to see the wagon master staring at me hard, trying to rein in his horse. His hat is missing, and sweat saturates his chambray shirt.

  “Go,” I mouth clearly.

  He flicks his gaze to the ship, then back to me, nods and then gallops back to the wagon train.

  I spin back to the soldiers, hoping my actions allow enough time for Maybelle to escape. Then a man in an immaculate grey suit strides out from the ship, his hair a deep black with grey streaks, the strands freshly cut. A smirk curves his lips.

  My gut swirls with a cold river of vengeance. I know his identity: he’s the man who was in charge of Maybelle’s accommodation—the one who almost killed her. A list of methods to destroy someone runs through my mind, and I hate myself for it. I never needed to think of this before I left the training facility on my home planet.

  He stops three feet away, and I let my gaze rake down his figure, searching for weapons. He pulls up his sleeve. The fabric shimmers in the sunlight. His wrists and hands glitter with the matrix of silver.

  “We are all wearing synthetic biofilm, my dear. You cannot pull water from our bodies,” he says with a nod at my hand. “We’ve been testing it for a year. I suggest you put your arm down. I am Marshal Graves, and you need to come with me. There’s no point resisting. I’m sure your sister’s around here somewhere. One word from me and I can reactivate the sound.”

  He’s done his preparation then. Dressed up like he’s going out to one of his elegant galas where the pandering flows thicker than cold honey. I ripped out every bit of water from the soldiers who held Maybelle captive in that dark jail cell, but I hadn’t meant to, and extraction is not the only way I can kill. The corner of my mouth tips up in a distant smile, because I’m not stupid enough to believe he’ll leave May alone if he can grab her.

  “How did you find me?” Just as a reminder for next time, I tell myself, knowing that for Maybelle to escape, I might have to go with him, however briefly.

  “There are sensors everywhere in this desert. They’ve been there for over a year. We knew you’d set them off if you tried to escape.”

  I stiffen at the mention of the state-of-the-art technology, which every government is dying to get their hands on. “Tachyon sensors?”

  He nods, arms stiff by his sides in his new suit. “You drew a great deal of water past those hills. When the data alerted us of water saturation, it was a simple case of following the signal. You can’t run from us.”

  I don’t let emotion show on my face. What else should I have done when faced with half the wagon train dying of thirst? Why does death follow me wherever I go?

  “Your sister is here, isn’t she?” Marshal’s gaze swings around to survey the remnants of the wagon train. Everyone else has gone. He turns back swiftly, his dark eyes calculating. “Well?”

  I remain silent, but the blue grows higher, and I call to all the water molecules in their bodies. True, the biofilm protects water from leaking out their pores; however it doesn’t mean I cannot drain water from other parts of their system. The mention of my sister doesn’t fool me for a minute—she’ll be their bargaining chip, as always. My heart crumbles at the idea of using my healing abilities for destruction. I pinpoint their brains, spinal column, eyes, ears, and heart. My vision goes completely x-ray.

  “If you return with us, she will be unharmed. If not we will make it our mission to hunt her down with the sound defence. If we don’t return, it will be done by those left in the city. You have no choice, my dear.” He sounds happy. “I suggest you come along without a fight.”

  “I will, if you let everyone else go,” I say. “Take me. Don’t go after any them. I’ll do what you say.”

  He grins and spins around, turning his back on me, as though it’s what he expects me to say. “The rest don’t concern me. You’re too valuable to let go.”

  I take a hesitant step toward him.

  “No, don’t, Tori!”

  I turn at the childish scream, my sight switching back to a three-dimensional view. Maybelle sprints on her short legs from behind an overturned wagon. She holds a scout’s rifle in her hands, lifts the heavy gun, and then aims the barrel for Marshal. One squeeze of the trigger, and the force of the kickback knocks her off her feet. The barrel flies up, and a bullet skews left, biting into Marshal Graves’s neck.

  His blood spews across the desert. He lands on his back.

  Twenty soldiers raise their lasers, pointing them toward May. The ends of the barrels crackle with electricity. Then they do the unthinkable. They fire.

  Chapter Four

  “No!” I sprint across the desert to my sister, but my boots are waterlogged, slowing my speed. I can’t outrace the lasers’ beams.

  Red light touches May’s skin. Her flesh dissolves. Turns black as ash. My vision slips into x-ray and my heart thunders. Her scream is a heart-wrenching wail. She holds her tiny hands over her stomach, jerks to the side, and then she sobs my name with her mouth pressed into the dirt.

  I fling myself in front of the lasers, my hair flying around my face. The light hits my back. I arch at the impact, but I don�
�t burn—all I sense is pressure. Water undulates across my body, soaking us both. I push fluid into May’s flesh, cooling the fire charring her tissues. I cover her body entirely, hugging her tiny black and white figure.

  The boy from the wagon train couldn’t determine what I am, but one look now will remove all doubt. I’ve never been fully human. My gaze zooms in and out, terrified to fully catalogue the damage to May’s stomach, her tissue, blood vessels, and muscles, to her left kidney and large intestine. Her beautiful, angelic face is blue from the reflection of the water rippling around my face.

  My hands jam into fists, elbows and knees pressing into the wet ground, denting the soil. My hair falls over my face in drenched tangles. “Just stay with me, May. Hang on. You are not dying here.”

  A sob breaks from her throat. I recall what my old master Astrakhan said about treating third degree burns. Every year the patches on wound care changed via his uplink with the Echyion elders, but I know I must be careful not to drop her body temperature too much. To escape permanent tissue damage, she will need medicine from the government’s clinics.

  Her eyes are shut, sandy lashes motionless on her sunburnt cheeks. I cradle her face and rise to my knees. Bits of her skin peek through the rips in her burnt dress, but I don’t touch the fabric and note her breathing rhythm. Steady. The lasers left a terrible wound straight through the left of her torso, but her heart still beats. Thank heavens. She has to be alive. I don’t know what I’ll do if I lose her. My eyes sting. “May?”

  A sharp zing of synergised electricity zaps through the sounds of the water. My aura protects us both. The Oshiro government’s foot soldiers haven’t stopped shooting the whole time—minions who tried to kill my sister.

  One look over my shoulder is all I need to give the water in their bodies a gentle push. But my teeth clench and eyes boil with fire. I barely recognise the emotions—the calm oasis inside me is a bleak and frozen winter. Something awful twists, pricks my conscience, and ices over my heart. Blackened clouds of power build, leak up between my gums, and then slither down to my soul.