The blast door shuddered. A high-pitched whine, then the sound of metal being chewed.
The world went white. The sound was not an explosion but a scream—the planet’s own cry as the plasma main ruptured. The shockwave threw the girl into a drainage culvert, knocking the breath from her lungs. When she crawled out, ears ringing, Tory Lane was gone. In its place was a crater of molten glass and twisted rebar, glowing cherry red in the perpetual night. rikki six tory lane
"You'll die too."
The girl—no, the woman now—picked up the slate. She didn't cry. She clutched it to her chest, the heat from the crater warming her back. She walked east, toward the subway, toward a train that would take her anywhere but here. The blast door shuddered
The girl held up a data-slate. It was cracked, but the glow on its screen painted her face in ghostly blue. On it, a file was open. A single photograph: Rikki, age ten, standing next to a man in a fusion-core jumpsuit. Her father. And behind him, a street sign warped by heat: TORY LANE. The sound was not an explosion but a
"What about you?"