My core twisted with pain and longing, and I choked the collar before it activated. I had an important thing to tell her, and the alarm would make it impossible.
“So please!” She tried to pull away to look at me, but I pressed her head down until her face buried in the crook of my neck.
“Stay like this or I’ll lose my balance. Sera, listen up now. I love you. You are a good person. Thank you for helping me become one, too.”
“No!”
She beat my back with her fist, but I barely felt it. The cyborg behind me steadily gained ground. I was almost to the peak, and the wind was even harder to brace against.
“Isamu, now.”
For a moment, nothing happened, and I couldn’t thwart a powerful beat of fear. My collar blared a piercing alarm, and Sera tried to say something, but I wasn’t able to hear her.
The buzzing of enormous dragonfly wings announced the arrival of the tanuki. They emerged from below, where they had likely hidden in the latticework frame of the arch. I tried to tell Sera one last time I loved her, but she screamed at me while the alarm blared. I hacked the collar to make it shut up and grabbed her hair roughly, pulling her face away so I could lie to her for the first time.
“Sera, I’ll get away under water. But you won’t be able to breathe, so you have to go now, okay? Go with Motori and Isamu. I’ll join you in a few hours.”
“You promise?” she asked, her face red with tears.
“I do.”
With a last, horrendous effort, I lifted her high. Isamu grabbed her under her armpits and instantly soared away, swaying from the added weight and the wind. I turned and shot the oncoming cyborgs, two, three, five. They either fell and lay there on top of the arch or tumbled into water.
Another helicopter was coming, this one likely equipped with guns and nets to capture me. I looked around. The police and battle cyborgs poured in from every side of the bridge, a few already waiting in the river. My energy was almost depleted, and I knew I wouldn’t get away. Still, I fired shot after shot, drawing attention to myself so the tanuki got away.
Motori held Sera’s legs now while Isamu supported her upper body. They made a strange sight, ungainly but steady. Soon, they disappeared behind a building. No one pursued them as far as I saw, and it made sense. The target of the pursuit was a rogue clanker, not a human woman.
I stopped shooting and thought about what else I could do. I couldn’t escape and I couldn’t save myself. My existence was strictly tied to my core, and once that was wiped, I would be gone. Still, I had a minute until I was captured, so I compiled a thorough status report, slapped my favorite memories on top, and added a quick message to Sera.
“It wasn’t your fault, sweetheart. Please don’t torture yourself like you did after your mom. Live a long, happy life. For me.”
I packaged it all and sent it to Gokiburi. I ran scenarios to find out what would give my captors more trouble—fishing me out of water or pulling me off the bridge? I decided to stay on the arch. I’d fight them all the way down as long as I had power, and that would increase their losses.
Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G Major played on my inner speakers, and I smiled to myself.
This was a good way to die.
Chapter 26
Sera
“Can you see anything? Did he jump in the water?” I asked when we left the city center behind and landed, taking a self-driving taxi. I was so worried about Dean, I didn’t even realize our car didn’t have a driver until we were in the forested area surrounding the landfill. Isamu fixed his and Motori’s wings to the roof, where magnets clamped them securely.
It was easier to hide in the busy evening traffic instead of the vast sky above.
“I didn’t see him jump,” Isamu said. “Maybe check on the news.”
I grabbed my phone. My AR glasses were gone since I dropped them as soon as I realized they could be used to track us. Notifications flooded my screen, and I almost cleared them all, but a tiny photo of Dean caught my eye. I opened the notification, which turned out to be a direct message—from someone calledzenkyorei.
Reina Zenkyoza?
“Your friend is scheduled for a core wipe in three hours. If you want to say your goodbyes, you will come visit me. See you soon.”
“He didn’t jump,” I whispered, turning desperately to Motori, who sat by my side. “He didn’t get away! They have him. Look!”
I thrust the phone in her face. It showed the picture of Dean being carried by two battle cyborgs, his feet dragging on the ground, his eyes barely lit. His face was slack. Was he even conscious? Oh God.
“We have to save him!” I screamed. “Turn around. Turn around!”
