Phoenix

Leaving Ace

Ash remembered only snippets of what happened after that. Images were like a dream remembered in disjointed fragments. First there was the flash of her reflection in a glossy window atop a bullet silver motorbike, strapped to the torso of a leathered rider. They were going so fast her hair was splayed about the rider's neck like a matted scarf.

A film of dust coated her eyes, forcing them closed. The hum of the road and the warmth of the rider's body against her back had her drifting into unconsciousness.

The next time she opened her eyes, it was to the sound of gunfire, so close she thought she saw a flash of orange in the rearview mirror. Her tandem rider gripped the handlebars so hard his knotted muscles seemed to turn to steel. In a ripping screech of tyres, he took the corner so sharply the knee of Ash's jeans was shorn clean against the road. There was the sound of metal grinding bitumen, followed by an ear-ringing explosion and she felt the billowing heat on the exposed skin of her face and neck.

Roads and buildings blurred into a stream of brown, grey and black. She squeezed her eyes shut, nausea rising, waiting for the world to right itself again. Only when the motorbike straightened and steadied did she dare to open them again.

Darkness swarmed and for a second, all she could see was black. Slowly, her vision adjusted and she made out the shadow of three riders—two to her left and one to her right, forming a migrating V around her. Her rear-vision mirror twinkled as the lights of the city shrunk behind them like a distant mirage. It was the first time she'd seen Ace from afar.

Ace was nothing like the advertisements on TV. It was no metropolitan oasis in the middle of the desert, but a sprawling artery system of roads sprouting from the blackened heart of the Establishment—the bomb-proof, windowless dome covered in spires the colour of the Director's eyes.

Then there was the ring around the Establishment—Middle Band—flashing with garish billboards and LCD strip lighting. All around, a concrete mixer of cement buildings rose from the ground like stubbed out cigarettes in an ash tray. She thought of the Madame, Amerie and the Palace, glad to be free of Middle Caster politics. Then she remembered she wasn't out of danger yet. She could be going somewhere worse than the state jail.

The lights of Junction Bridge were a faint chalky stripe and the flickering lamps of Outer Band a marbled smudge mingling with plumes of dark factory smoke. Beyond that, there was nothing but sparse, flat desert, tufted with tumbleweed and the straight dusty road they were on, leading into an inky horizon and navy strata sky.

Her eyelids drooped closed and her thoughts wandered. They said it was impossible to leave Ace, that there was nothing for miles but desert, dehydration and death. She wondered if she was already dead and dreaming her way into the next world. For a fleeting moment, that didn't seem so bad. Then, she felt the warmth of her tandem rider's body against hers, the rumble of the engine beneath and the one reason she couldn't leave this world. Not yet.

"Jai." The name brushed her dry, chapped lips like a cool mist and she tried to wriggle upright in her seat.

A firm hand pressed her back down. "Rest now."

As though commanded, her eyes flitted closed and she drifted back into unconsciousness.

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