She dreamed of swimming in a lake, the water thick like jelly between her fingers and toes. Boats shaped like swans floated on the surface carrying people dressed in brilliant crimson and vibrant jade. Water lapped over her head and she struggled to kick back to the surface as tendrils of fog crept across the lake like a living thing. The people began to chatter as the water closed over her head again, a woman laughed, high and shrill...
No. Not a woman. Her phone.
Maria sat up, gasping for breath. Curls of her brown hair stuck to her cheeks, neck, and shoulders, slick with sweat. She fumbled for the handset with shaking hands, trying to calm her breathing, to find a place of grey so she could be unemotional. It was the dreams. She still couldn't fathom them after several weeks, or understand where they came from and why they made her heart race.
She hit the 'receive' button on the sixth ring. "Cleric Jabez."
"Today."
The familiar voice drew a shuddering sigh from her as she relaxed all at once, letting go of the last vestiges of dream fear that she'd tried to lock away in her mind.
"I'm going to end it today."
She could hear it, rage, fear, and sorrow. Later, she could ask, and perhaps offer to share in his pain as he had once shared in hers. But not now. Neither could afford it. "Understood. We'll celebrate at sunset, if we survive."
"If we survive." he repeated, his voice dead.
Unfamiliar pain tugged at her heart. "Strength and luck, Cleric Preston. All that I have."
"All that we have. Strength and luck." The line went dead.
She took three breaths, filling her lungs to the bursting point and breathing out slowly through her nose. It was time to end it. It was time to stop hiding. The familiar dull fire of anger stirred deep within her, destroying her fears and flowing warmth into her fingertips. Only then did she dial the number that she'd memorized those few weeks ago, when Preston had introduced her to the resistance leaders.
The only answer on the other end was three soft clicks. She'd been told to expect this. "Jabez," she said, "I know that it is time to right the wrongs."
An unfamiliar voice answered her after a pause so long she feared that she'd been misled. "We understand. You know where to meet us."
Maria cut the line off, then turned the handset over and pulled out the batteries to erase the set's memory. "I never truly thought this day would come," she whispered to the inert device, "and now I don't know if I should laugh or weep. And I know that I don't have the time for either."
There wasn't much time. She hurried into her clothes, pulling on the long black coat of the Cleric for what might be the last time. Every pocket held a full clip for her guns; the weapons themselves were tucked into her sleeves, ready to drop to her hands.
She smiled her reflection as she pinned her hair back into a smooth bun. Her skin was pale in the stark light, her brown eyes dark with purpose over her incongruous hawk nose. "You're a handsome devil," she murmured, sudden humor bubbling up at her own forced seriousness, "let's dance."
The meeting place was an abandoned book cellar, redolent with the scent of mildewing books and rotting shelves. She found her contact in the furthest stacks, regarding her with terrible weariness from washed out blue eyes.
"Cleric Maria Jabez. I've heard a lot about you." He was a sad ghost of a man; he looked as if he'd been stretched thin and then bleached, washing out even his clothing to off white.
"Good, I hope."
"We should all hope. Your task is nearly as critical as Cleric Preston's."
"What do you need of me?" She asked, folding her hands together in front of her.
"Disable the defenses of Equilibrium. Take down the communications. Do anything that you can to hamper troop movement and coordination."
Her mouth was suddenly too dry to allow speech, so she merely nodded.
"You'll know it's time when Cleric Preston destroys "Father's" video feeds. That's when we'll be blowing the Prozium factories. I hope it's a task you're equal to."
"I hope that we're all equal to our tasks." She turned to leave.
"Wait." When she looked back at the man, he pulled a small black box from his pocket, flipping it open. "You'll need this."
She didn't bother trying to hide her revulsion. Its force made her take a step back. "Prozium."
"It's the only way. You may be questioned. You may be confronted."
"I've been questioned before."
He shook his head. "Your tasks are critical. Failure isn't an option on this. It can't be."
Anger flooded through her once again. Her hands twitched into fists. "You don't trust me?"
The man spoke with great care. "We trust you, Maria. We don't trust your temper. You're too new to emotion, and too wild. Sometimes there needs to be a sacrifice for the good of the whole, in the interest of success."
Something clicked within her, a final puzzle piece falling into place. "You still take Prozium."
"For the good of the whole, so that some day we all can be free."
She reached for the injector without further comment. It was too familiar in her hand, and the weight of it made her ill. "Quickly then, before I lose my nerve." A brief sting, a snap of cold, and it was done. The anger died in a numbing wave, the fear retreated. Once again, she was adrift in grey. "And I can't even weep for it, or regret," she mused.
"If luck is on our side, you will soon. And then there will be no cause for regret."
This time, she did turn and walk away, not glancing back as she tossed the injector onto the floor. "I sincerely doubt that."
She walked to work as normal from the meeting place, following her old habits with ease. Her desk was ever so slightly disorganized, and she idly rearranged her various tools until the layout matched that of the desk in front of her precisely. Reports seemed a good excuse to be at her desk, so she pulled up the latest batch in from their investigators and was pleased to note that there were no indications of today's intended insurrection.
Between pages of black on white text, she pulled up the facility maps for the building, refreshing her memory on the layout, the location of posts and monitoring rooms. Her primary, secondary, and tertiary targets were identified, and she worked her way down the list until she reached a point where she was certain she would have run out of ammunition.
Minutes clicked by on her desktop clock and she waited patiently, for the first time in years actually listening to the speech of Father on his myriad of screens. As the hour approached sunset, it happened: the almost comforting background monologue sputtered and died. Her coworkers stirred at their desks, their faces filled with confusion and shock.
Maria stood. The cold logic of her plan spread out before her. "It's the resistance," she announced, "they're hacking our system. Someone get the techs on line, we need to shut it off now!"
"Right away, Cleric Jabez!"
The room fell into a flurry, some turning off their terminals, others who were a little more technically adept attempting to work a counter hack on a non-existent attack. It would keep them busy for a while. A heavy hand fell on her shoulder before she could take a single step.
"Cleric Jabez, what of building security?"
She glanced back at her partner, her gaze never wavering from his stormy grey eyes. "We will need to secure the vital entry points. Clerics Samson and Gray! Front entrance. Cleric Moore! East entrance. Cleric Polniac! South entrance. Cleric Branston, I want you to secure the sub-basement service tunnels."
He raised a single eyebrow. "The sub-basements?"
"It's a point of extreme vulnerability. I'll double check the security of the upper floors and then join you." To her relief, he nodded and released her. "Deploy!"
The Clerics not involved in the struggle with the computer system scattered as she strode away, toward the lifts. The sub-basements. It would keep Branston out of the way, and safe. By the time he realized something was amiss, she should have activated the building's defenses and released nerve gas into the lower levels. It was designed to minimize losses on both sides.
There would be no cause for regret.
The communications room was minimally staffed, guarded by two low-level officers. Each one took three bullets, and she emptied the rest of her clips into the computer panels. Half of the lights on the floor went out , lighting the corridors with spitting and sparking electricity as she strode to her next target.
She was a grim reaper, a scythe of bullets destroying everything in her path. Men fell and lay still, letting out one last little moan of breath. Computers turned into ruins under her hands, panels set to self-destruct and defensive systems either turned off or turned against the very people they were supposed to defend. Klaxons sounded through the building as she turned on the gas dump, bright red light strips flaring on in the ceiling. She barely had time to grab a gas mask before the yellow fog reached her level. The entire world turned unreal and ghastly.
Objectives accomplished. Elapsed time, twenty-six minutes.
Maria headed back for the lifts, intending to join the resistance at street level. To her left, a door hissed open and she whipped around, bringing her guns to bear.
Gas mask. Blonde hair. Two guns to match hers, pointed squarely at her chest. Solemn grey eyes, wide with shock.
"Branston," she said, the word sounding oddly hollow through the mask.
"You..."
They fired at the same time, each knocking the other's gun out of the way. Branston spun back around, and she blocked again, kicking him solidly in the stomach. He fell back a step and brought his guns up again, forcing her into a dive that ended with the butt of her pistol slamming into his sternum. A line of fire seared her shoulder and she let out a strangled cry, before shoving herself away from him, knocking his guns wide with her own. She stepped back, taking a defense crouch in the third form of the kata and tried to ignore the blood dripping from the mercifully superficial wound on her shoulder.
"Why?" Branston asked. "You're better than this."
She fired, her bullet grazing his hand and throwing up sparks along his gun. He dropped it with a shout of pain. "You're my partner."
His eyes narrowed behind the plastic lens of the mask. "Not any more."
Again he fired. Their guns slammed against each other, and bullets ricocheted from the walls, shredding the clouds of gas. She twisted around, blocking with one gun as she fired with the other, cutting his collarbone in half. He fell limp against the wall, leaving a bright blossom of blood behind. Quickly, she leaned forward, reaching for his mask.
Branston's eyes snapped open and he whipped up his remaining gun, firing into her hip. Her world turned white and she could hear nothing but the crack of the gun and the horrible sound-feeling of her bones shattering as she fell.
The floor slamming against her back threw her momentarily from shock as more adrenaline flowed into her system. It turned the already thick hair into molasses that she could barely suck in through the mask's filters as she brought her guns up. In the eternity between seconds she took careful aim, feeling the shot click in her mind as she squeezed the triggers.
Branston's second gun flew from his hand with a shower of white sparks and blood. More blood sprayed across the wall as her other bullet shattered his mask, grazing his temple as it passed through. She met his eyes for a moment, wide with disbelief before the gas filled his lungs and he fell to one side, truly unconscious.
It was time to get out. Her breath came in hissing gasps as she clawed her way up the wall, gloved fingers scrabbling for purchase. Her coat clung to her right leg, thick with blood as she dragged herself inch by painful inch to the lifts. The world was a blur; she wove in and out of consciousness as she made her way to the building's closest exit. It was only when she shoved the sealed door to the outside open that she remembered the Cleric she had assigned there.
Cleric Moore was only beginning to turn, his hands out to catch his guns as she fired. Her first shot shattered his scapula and spun him around. Her second shot caught him slightly above the left knee, incapacitating him. Moore screamed as he fell, a high, thin sound like a wounded animal with the clatter of his guns hitting the pavement in counterpoint.
The door hissed shut behind her as she limped to him, her hands never leaving the support of the wall. She swept his guns away with her useless leg, almost blacking out from the pain of movement. The last of her strength lowered her to the ground near him. He was hissing with each breath, his eyes glazed with pain. She'd never realized until now how young he was; barely out of boyhood, really.
Maria pulled off the gas mask and tossed it aside, then carefully tucked her guns back into her sleeves. Around them, the sky was ablaze, a glory of blood red fire and swirling orange clouds. Far off, she could hear the chatter of gunfire, and the ground rumbled with explosions that sent frissions of pain up her spine.
"It'll be alright, now," she murmured, though she wasn't certain if she was speaking to Moore or herself , "They'll be here soon, Cleric Moore, and we'll be taken care off." Maria reached out and gently smoothed back the boy's hair. The gesture felt unnatural.
As more tears squeezed from his eyes, she took his good hand, weaving her fingers with his. "It's sunset. It's time to celebrate," she said, and turned her gaze to the sky, waiting to feel something at the sight.