Daughter of Mars #89 | (Neurona Prime Part 1)
Risa slid her NetMini back onto her belt. Silence hung like a thick blanket over the room. If the people who’d grabbed Pavo found Aurelia, she might already be out of time to help. She glanced at Chaia, waiting with an expectant face by the door. The girl nodded. She thinks we should go, maybe it isn’t too late? Risa felt sick to her stomach. I’m not leaving a little girl alone in a Syndicate den. Psionic or not, it’s not a good idea. A growl warbled through her gut. What am I going to do? Bring her with me?
“Yes,” said Chaia. She shifted her gaze to Tamashī. “I’m not a WellTech doll. Risa did not buy me.”
“She’s so creepy.” Tamashī shivered. “And adorable! Ooh, I want one. Where’d you get her?”
Chaia stuck her thumbs in the waistband of her leggings, yelling, “I am not a WellTech doll.”
Risa rushed over and grabbed her arm before the girl could drop her pants to prove her anatomical correctness. “That’s not necessary. I… Uh. I gotta go.”
“Okay.” Tamashi shut off the video game and reached for her Nishihama Shinobi deck. Red Kanji lit up on the left side of the sleek, black slab when she plugged in. “I’ll keep poking that video.”
Chaia furrowed her brow. “I’m not a robot.”
“There better ways to go about convincing someone of that than flashing them.” Risa tugged on her arm.
The girl folded her arms, seeming far more upset at being mistaken for an android than at being kidnapped and threatened with a gun. “I’m not a machine. I’m real.”
Oh, Raziel help me. Risa put her hands on the girl’s shoulders, whispering, “Chaia, calm down. She didn’t mean it. Send her a telepathic message. Dolls can’t do that.”
Chaia’s glower softened to a plaintive expression. “People are scared of that. I don’t wanna get hit again.”
“Tamashī, she’s not a doll.” Risa bit her lip. “What the hell am I standing here arguing this for?”
“Be safe,” yelled Tamashī. “I’ll vid you if I find anything. I’m looking for your cop friend now.”
“Come on, kid.” Risa walked for the door.
“Okay, okay, I believe you.” Tamashī sighed.
Risa whirled, about to scream at the girl, but found her at the side of the bed jamming a handful of shumai dumplings in her mouth rather than having her pants around her knees. The breath she’d drew in to shout with slid through her teeth.
Chaia muttered something to Tamashī through a mouthful of dough before walking back to Risa with puffed hamster cheeks. The kid’s a precog. Maybe four seconds of delay will make a difference between living and dying?
The girl’s voice entered her mind. No. I was hungry. The tone dropped to an apologetic half-whisper. And I’m not a doll.
If not for the worry on her mind, Risa might have smiled at the silly face. With a sigh, she stomped down the hallway to the elevator. Chaia jogged to keep up, flashing a doughy grin once the capsule closed.
“We’re wasting time.” Risa glanced at the minutes ticking by in her field of vision.
“Wmf”―Chaia rolled her eyes―We have time.
Risa tapped her foot until the elevator stopped. Repetitious female moaning came from one of the white doors in the corridor between the elevator and the inner sanctum. At least she sounds happy. Chaia didn’t react to the noise. When they passed the ornate bronze barrier, Walsh startled and popped up.
“Risa? Where’d you come from?”
“Tamashī’s room.” She headed right for the burgundy curtains without waiting for a reply.
At the midpoint of the lobby, Chaia glanced at the man behind the front desk. “He thinks you’re a bitch.”
“I get that a lot.” Risa didn’t break stride until she spotted a PubTran kiosk a block from the Orbital’s front door. “Shit.”
Chaia stopped at her side. “You don’t know where she is.”
“No.” Risa grumbled. “I doubt she’s in Elysium. We might as well go to the shuttleport so we’re ready when Tamashī calls.”
“Okay.” Chaia closed her eyes.
Risa dialed up a ride on the waist-high obelisk-shaped terminal, and paced back and forth while waiting. Two minutes and six seconds after she requested a taxi, a tiny, boxy car squealed to a halt by the pedestal and opened its side door.
“Thank you for choosing PubTran Corporation for your transportation needs. Your car has arrived.”
“Thanks, I wouldn’t have noticed it pull up if you didn’t say anything.” She got in, but the child remained motionless.
“Chaia, the car’s here.”
The girl ignored her.
“Ugh, what is wrong with you?” Risa crawled out and tugged on the kid’s arm, but she swayed as if unconscious on her feet. “Now what?”
After carrying the girl to the car and pulling the door closed, Risa waved her NetMini over the console. “Inter-city shuttle terminal please.”
“Your trip cost is twenty six credits. Risk of an unscheduled violence event at location”―the pitch of the voice changed for one word―“shuttleport is minimal. Please sit back and enjoy your ride.”
Risa rested her elbow on the sidewall, propping her head in one hand while staring at the swaying, small body in the facing seat. Patches of light from outside signs created squares of pink, orange, and green, that slid through the car. The girl wobbled to the side whenever the taxi swerved to avoid a pedestrian or aggressive advert bot. Chaia flew into the wall when the car pulled a hard right, and sprawled onto the floor.
“Ow.” She left her eyes shut, and reached up to grab her face.
Risa reached down, got her hands under the girl’s arms, and pulled her up in the seat next to her. “Was that some psionic thing you were doing?”
“I was trying to get a vision. I didn’t see much but tunnels with stores. It’s almost useless for me to try to see someone I don’t know. Sorry.”
“Tunnels… an underground city. That narrows it down to about six.” Risa pounded a fist on the seat. “Arcadia and Elysium have underground sections too.”
“Sorry.” Chaia looked downcast.
“It’s not your fault. You’re just a kid.” Risa took her hand. “Don’t blame yourself.”
“I saw a car with MDF on the door in grey letters.”
Risa drummed her fingers on the hard plastic bench. “It’s flimsy, but if you saw her car that means she’s still in Primus.”
Chaia continued to sulk.
Risa patted her on the back. “Thank you for trying.”
The girl looked up. Her sullen expression had faded, but she hadn’t decided to smile either. The PubTran car drove around in a wide arc, using a courtyard full of people in front of the shuttle port as a U-turn space. A few beggars dove for cover, exaggerating the danger from the creeping, tiny car.
Within seconds of entering the terminal, Risa’s NetMini rang. A few flicks of the eye answered in wireless mode, presenting her with a virtual holo-panel bearing an image of Tamashī’s avatar―a grinning cat-eared ninja girl.
“I think she’s in Primus. Her implant went off signal thirty-two minutes ago on Tier 4, Sector 58.”
“I didn’t think she had an implant.” Risa grabbed Chaia’s hand and walked towards a row of large, boxy machines aglow with holo-terminals. “You were right, she’s in Primus.”
“All MDF personnel have bio-monitor implants and tracking devices. Even if she was dead it would be transmitting an ‘oh shit’ signal. Wherever she is, I’m betting they have a jammer set up.”
“They didn’t go out of range? There’s no signal deep below.” Risa stopped at a Vendomat and purchased two seats on an Elysium-Primus flight.
“If that was true, the signal would’ve registered going down. It just stopped on Tier 4.” Tamashi whined. “I gotta go. Walshie wants me to go steal some pixels.”
“Walshie?” Risa chuckled, leading the girl by the hand on the way to the boarding area. “I’d love to see his face if you called him that. We’re about to get on a shuttle now. Let me know if you find anything else. Damn… I hope we have enough time.”
The window with Tamashī’s neko-chan persona vanished as the call ended.
“Think we’ll make it in time?” Risa stopped by a row of seats in the waiting area, not bothering to use them.
Chaia shrugged. “It doesn’t work like that. I don’t see the future unless something’s gonna happen to me or someone I really, really like.”
“Oh.” Risa glanced off to the side. “Sorry about your father.”
A little red formed around the girl’s eyes as she took Risa’s hand and stared at her for a long, silent minute. “I’m sorry about your father.”
Related posts:
Daughter of Mars #87 | (Chaia)Daughter of Mars #88 | (Fragments)Daughter of Mars #74 (Blind Wish part 4)
