One Heartbeat

The crowd pushed against us from all sides, moving towards the river parks and the safety of the skyrail trains. Deimo Akaiannyi must have gone mad. She ignored the shouts and screams as we ran along Karudesa Street towards the memorial, but at my insistence, we stayed in the building’s shadows. For the assassin to see us, he would have needed to look beyond the decorative trees and shrubs that separated the street from the pedestrian walkway.

The monument is hollow, she said. We can go in there contact my head of security. Everything will be fine. I wanted to believe her.

Keeping up with the nineteen-year-old Deimo proved a daunting task. It meant straining my body past its breaking point and ignoring the pain that fired through my side. Back in Menarka, I had visited the gymnasium every other day; my fitness had suffered since coming to Galasu.

Finally, I stopped and leaned against one of the shrubs. The monument shone in the morning sunlight, half a block and an eternity away, completely open to anyone following us. I never should have listened to Deimo Akaiannyi’s plan.

I gripped my knees and tried to make my breathing more regular. The Deimo watched me. Her face reminded me of a statue I had seen in the Thassannyi Museum of Tveshi Art. But statues don’t move; Deimo Akaiannyi reached beneath her dress for a small bottle of pills in a hidden pocket. Here. They keep me going when I get exhausted.

What are they?

She removed the cap and hooked her index finger inside, shrugging her shoulders. Nnyikhi tablets. They’re from the High Wilds. She held out two. We don’t have much time.

I heaved my hand forward and closed it over the pills. Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw movement and heard gunfire.

Deimo Akaiannyi’s pill bottles fell to the ground. Its contents spread across the sidewalk.

The kidiptu has a time lag of ¼ second. No one can pull two triggers at the same time, and the slight lag between them can penetrate most non-military shielding. Deimo Akaiannyi screamed.

Our protection shattered into billions of tiny pieces, leaving us naked and alone. The shield disappeared without a trace. So stupid,, I thought. This was all so stupid.

The man had a biotech tattoo, a karudu. Its beak touched his lower lip and its probe tentacles swirled up below his eyes. The other four tentacles spread out in rays along his cheeks, and its bulbous body stretched out along his neck, linking at the back with feelers. It was designed to look very real, and possibly to intimidate, but it proved that he had a personality beyond killing.

It goes without saying that he wore a bracelet on his wrist with the Meitasako crest.

Deimo Akaiannyi closed her eyes and began to pray.

You don’t have to do this, I said. You know a political cause is doomed when its adherents start committing violence against their fellow human beings.

He checked the ammo on both of the guns, keeping his eyes on me. Sometimes need to die so humanity can move on. Sometimes that’s the only way to make change.

So you’re with Daybreak, then? Not just some assassin they hired off the street? His fingers flexed on the guns and he opened his mouth to speak. Jikuvë, right? Your son—

What do you know about my son?

You must love him, right? If you do this now, you’ll throw it away, all of that love, all of that potential. No one will hire him. No one will give him anything. But if you put the gun down now, none of that has to happen. No one needs to know that you came this close to killing the most important woman in the world.

Jikuvë lowered the guns and cocked his head to the side. He turned. Deimo Akaiannyi opened her eyes and looked at me. Mësahelepui.

You’re right, Jikuvë said. No one needs to know. No one will.

Two gunshots.

Two wounds: one in the abdomen, I’m told, and the other in the chest.

One weapon fired by one man who moved faster than water rushing through rapids.

One woman who knelt on the ground clutching herself and trying to speak, trying to scream, a nineteen-year-old who had never asked to rule over a state or be born into the bloodline of bloodlines, Sehet Annyi’s chosen family.

Two individuals who had no chance of survival.

She lay on the ground. I like to think that she still lived and knew what happened. It would make my next action seem less like the encore to a symphony of stupidity.

I rushed Jikuvë and pinned him to the ground. The gun fired into my thigh, passing right trough the femoral artery.

To say that it hurt is an understatement. I barely even noticed when he elbowed me in the stomach. I fell backwards and hit my head against the pavement. Blood fountained from my leg and black spots danced in my vision. Jikuvë got to his feet and pointed the gun at my head.

I heard the shot and felt nothing.

Everything stopped.