Above the Clouds

The elevator finally whined to a standstill, and the doors opened to reveal the dark underside of Columbia. As bright and clean and well heeled as the streets were above, dingy and dirty and destitute were the streets of Shantytown. Sarah could easily see why the residents called it that.

It was dimly lit - no sunshine made it down here past the factory smoke and the buildings so tall that you could barely see the top. There were some buzzing street lamps, and fires burned in old oil drums along the cobbles. Rubbish was everywhere. It looked like there had been attempts to keep it under control, and swept into haphazard piles but the breeze scattered bits and pieces around.

Boxes and crates had been set up with old food sacks as bed and blanket. They lined the streets and alleyways, and Sarah wondered how many people lived down here. More than the ‘official’ number, she was sure. It reminded her of some of the less savoury areas of New York, or London. Lines of washing stretched overhead between the buildings.

The people were thin and tired looking, hunched over in corners, or warming themselves around the drums. Hastily painted signs asked for for food, for work, for medicine to help sick children. A  Fink MFG sign flickered in the background, not a few of the light bulbs broken.

A large piece of cardboard that read WHY HAST THOU FORSAKEN US? leaned against a crate on which stood a man shouting out a sermon of his own to a small crowd.

“This is what they want, brothas...to keep you so HUNGRY you can't speak but to beg... To keep you so IGNORANT you can't think of solutions to all your problems... To keep you CHASIN' that almighty SILVER EAGLE, so you can BUY EVERYTHING they're sellin'...to keep you down, brothas... But Daisy Fitzroy says there's ANOTHER WAY...another way comin' REAL SOON.”

The people around him didn’t cheer, but nodded and made sounds of agreement.

There was a feeling in the air. Change was coming, alright, for good or bad.

Helena was looking around in disbelief as they picked their way along the street that led away from the elevator, her hands picking at each other. A woman in a grubby apron sorted food cans on a crate, next to a pile of dead rats. Sarah felt queasy. If you were hungry enough, any meat was meat.

“This is because of Fink?” Helena asked flatly. Her eyes followed a gaggle of kids as they dug through a pile of half-rotten fruit, one using a short, sharp knife to remove the edible bits and pass them to the smallest first. “Daisy’s right. He needs to pay. For all of this.”

Sarah nodded.

“Not before she pays us,” she said, scanning the streets that led off this one. One led a twisting path off to the right. Ahead was a small plaza and a sign on a squat building that read ‘Graveyard Shift’. A faint sound of music escaped the half-boarded up windows. Sarah grinned. She could smell a bar from ten blocks away, but this one was right there.

“The impound is probably that way.” she pointed right. Then she tipped her chin forward. “How about we just...check out this place first, hey?” She’d pulled the cap off again - it was colder down here and she raked her hair over her shoulders. Helena looked at the bar, wrinkled her nose, then back at Sarah, who had her eyebrows raised hopefully.

“Hm,” she said, her voice doubtful. Sarah tried pouting a little, and Helena’s mouth twitched into a small smile. “Alright. But not too long.”

Sarah grinned crookedly and slid her arm through Helena’s, escorting her down the shallow steps and across the paved plaza.

“At least we’re among…” she considered the word ‘friends’. “...people who don’t want us dead.” And I can relax for five minutes and have a drink, she thought. Her eyes ran over the surrounding area. Other large brick buildings floated nearby, crowding the sky. The flicker of tears caught her gaze - one...two...three...there seemed to be more popping up as they went along. Maybe Helena was attracting them.

Helena pulled her hat off as well and shoved it into a pocket. After extensive rummaging, she pulled out the faded red ribbon and used it to tie the wild blonde curls back into a ponytail. It caught Sarah’s eye again, and she rubbed her forehead as a headache came and went.

She remembered...red ribbons on dark braids. Which was stupid, because there hadn’t been any hair ribbons in the orphanage, and Mrs S didn’t hold with that kind of frivolity either. It must have been some other girl. A school friend. Someone.

There was a pause in the chatter when they entered the bar, and suspicious faces turned towards them, smoothing out when they saw that the two young women didn’t wear the blue uniform of the Authority. The crowd was mixed - men and women, black and white, irish and chinese, they all sat at rough wooden tables and drank together. Sarah headed straight for the bar. It consisted of wooden doors laid over barrels, and a wide range of bottles on shelves behind a barman who watched her with his arms crossed and a sharply wary look. Some of the bottles were unlabeled, but Sarah could tell bathtub moonshine when she saw it.

She dug in the satchel for some silver dollars, and nodded at the barman.

“Bourbon,” she said.

He nodded back, slid a mostly clean glass across the bar, and poured a measure of dark liquid into it. From a bottle with a label on it, she was relieved to see. The bourbon went down her throat too easily, and she gestured for a refill.

Helena, meanwhile, had wandered over to the gramophone in the corner, and was currently leafing through the stack of recordings. A bluesy number was spinning below the flared trumpet, a voice wailing about tainted love. Sarah wondered if this was one of the other Finks recordings and where he had heard it.

She picked up her glass and ambled through the crowded tables, half heard conversations floating into her ears on the way.

Fitzroy says be ready, we head up soon….their little girl was dying, the Vox got the medicine she….just sayin’, we could be dead tomorrow and….haven’t seen those two before…

“Lookin’ for somethin’ in particular?” Sarah nudged Helena with an elbow, interrupting her humming. She took a sip, letting the bourbon roll around her mouth, listening to the music. “Don’t mind this one,” she said, tapping a boot to the rhythm

Helena tilted her head to the side, and looked at Sarah.

“Those dreams. Do you remember...music?” She hummed a little, stopped, and shook her head. “Sometimes I think I know. Then it -” she wriggled her finger in a spiral. “ - floats away.”

Sarah opened her mouth to say ‘no’ and paused, her brow creasing. She closed her eyes and thought about the green light and...

“Yeah,” she said, her voice low. “It makes me want to dance.” She opened her eyes again and shrugged, sipping her drink. “Can’t remember how it goes, though.”

Helena kept pawing through the records, disappointment on her face.

“I’ll find it.” she whispered. “Somewhere…”

Sarah tipped the remainder of her borbon down her throat, looked longingly at the bar, sighed, and put the glass down on the nearest table. She could hold her liquor but she didn’t want to get sloppy.

“C’mon, Helena, we better go do this. Don’t wanna keep Daisy waiting too long.” She stared into the air for a moment, then cleared her throat and shuffled her boots on the grimy floorboards when she realised Helena was trying not to laugh. “What?”

“You were smiling.” Helena told her. She clasped her hands together under her chin and batted her eyelashes at Sarah. “Don’t want to keep Daisy waiting,” she repeated and then pursed her lips and made kissing noises. Sarah felt her face heat up.

“Shut up,” she muttered. “C’mon!”

Now Helena did laugh, and she followed Sarah back out the door and along the street to the impound. It twisted and turned, made narrower by numerous shelters cobbled together out of wood and sheets of corrugated iron.

They passed more people, huddling around the fires, or in corners under old sacks, some stretched out on grubby thin mattresses, coughing, weeping, or just staring blankly into space. The sky was blocked by clouds and smog and smoke from the factories. Sarah had no idea what time of day it was. The sun had been bright up in Finkton though…

Helena had stopped laughing fairly quickly, and she paused to speak to people along the way, a few words here and there, digging in her pockets for sweets and sharing them out with the children. Sarah didn’t know what she was saying, but when she rejoined Sarah, she looked worried, the set of her jaw revealing her anger as well.

They reached another small open area. A few small garden beds, full of ripe tomatoes and budding corn, were fenced off and hung with notices saying ‘Assets Seized by order of the Columbia Authority - Vox Sympathisers’. Sarah and Helena looked at each other, their faces mirroring each other with quiet anger. Then they saw the two men in stocks at the top of the stairs, and Helena’s expression turned to shock. Sarah wished she was shocked.

The sign in front of the stocks labeled the men Labour Agitators. Other signs were stacked around - Traitors. Propagandists. Fifth Columnists.

“If I was made to work sixteen hour days for no actual money, I’d be agitatin’ as well,” Sarah muttered. The men didn’t look at them as they passed, their faces resigned as they stared at the ground. After a moment, she realised Helena wasn’t following, and she turned to see her picking the big padlocks that were keeping the stocks firmly shut.

“Shite,” Sarah muttered, and rejoined her. “Helena, we don’t have time for…”

Helena cut her off.

“You had time for a drink,” she pointed out, calmly carrying on with the second padlock. The first man was standing, rubbing his wrists, and eyeing Sarah warily, but Helena gratefully.

Sarah pressed her lips together. Girl had a point. The two men thanked Helena in low, hoarse voices, then supported each other back down the stairs and vanished into the gloom. The two women walked in silence along the rest of the crooked street, and came in sight of the impound. Sarah cursed long and hard.

This wasn’t some dodgy little watch house. This was a multi-story fortress, fronted with gun turrets, and likely filled with heavily armed police. Voices floated up towards them, and Sarah sidled up to the iron fencing ahead and peered down on a small fleet of gunships, dotted with blue uniforms. Helena crouched beside her, fingers curled around the metal of the fence, resting her forehead on the railing, and glowering at the man who was shouting at the rest.

“The Vox Populi are the bastard child of the Foreigner and the Heathen, and like all bastards, we serve it best by smothering it in its crib. We hear tell that the gunsmith was making weapons for the Vox. We squashed that gunsmith like a bug and took his tools for our own! Make no mistake, soldiers: the Vox and weapons go together like fire and gunpowder. One spark and we'll have a blaze we cannot control!”

Sarah scowled. She could see who the bastards around here were, and it weren’t the Vox. She crouched down next to Helena.

“I count a dozen down there,” she nodded. “Get through them, jump on the sky-line to the station, I’ll use my vigors on the turret and that should get us in the door, at least.” She concentrated, flicking her fingers until they glowed green. “You ready?”

Helena kept looking at the guards below them.

“It’s not just Fink, is it?” she asked slowly. “It’s...Rachel.”

Sarah was taken aback. Helena had never referred to the woman by just her name before. It sounded strange without the ‘Sister’ preceding it.

Helena kept talking.

“It’s just. She’s in charge. She must know. ” She finally looked at Sarah. “Maybe she kept me locked up. Because she knew I’d…” Her voice trailed off and she let her forehead bump against the railing. Sarah touched her shoulder.

“We’ll make it up to Comstock House, yeah? And then you can talk to her yourself. Give her a right bollocking.” She half-laughed, but Helena didn’t even smile. Sarah tried another tactic. “I mean, Rachel didn’t start this - ”Sarah waved a hand to encompass all of the floating city. “She just - played along.”

“Is that any better?” Helena said sadly. She stood up, exposing herself to the guards, and moved quickly towards the stairs that led down to the gunships.

“Oi!” Sarah hissed, but it was too late. “Shite!” She followed, running, and glancing down at the guards to see if they’d noticed.

One of them saw Sarah, and nudged the guard next to them, pointing. She and Helena weren’t wearing the scarlet sashes of the Vox, which probably bought them just enough time to attack. Sarah aimed her hand at the guard, sending off a green cloud. Then he drew his weapon and shot the man next to him. Suddenly they were all shooting - at Sarah, at the possessed guard - and then Helena was on the deck of the first ship, blonde curls whipped around her head by the wind.

Sarah was ducking and weaving, behind pillars, down the stairs, and then she was beside her, fingers crackling with electricity.

The possessed guard was down, and a few others were too. As the survivors turned their guns on the two girls, Sarah let loose the Shock-Jockey, and it arced from the nearest guard to the last, then the air was full of screams and the smell of burning flesh. She felt Helena move beside her, and then a heavy sensation, and the guards were lifted off their feet and sent flying. There were no walls to stop them here - the bodies dangled in the air and then dropped down into the clouds and vanished.

Sarah swallowed, fiddling with the strap of the satchel while stealing a glance at Helena’s determined face. She was staring up at the Watchhouse, forehead creased. Then her gaze dropped to the dead guards speculatively. Sarah looked at them too.

“The uniforms?” she said, prodding one corpse with her boot. There were some bloodstains, but that shouldn’t draw any attention given the circumstances, and the sizes weren’t too far off. “That should help get us in the door at least.”

“No more sneaking,” Helena said. Her face dropped. “Oh. My coat.”

Sarah shrugged.

“Leave the coat here, we’ll pick it up on the way out.” She pulled her hair back off her face, scratched her scalp. “Yeah. This could work.” She picked up a blue cap that had fallen from a head now facing downwards on the decking, putting it on and tucking her hair up into it. Then she looked at Helena again and smacked herself in the forehead. “No it won’t!” She pointed at their faces, their identical faces. Funny how she had stopped thinking about it after a while, like it had just always been that way.

Helena, one arm still in the coat sleeve, looked at Sarah, and touched her own face with her free hand.

“Oh,” she said, wonderingly, “I had forgot also.” She slid her arm free and dropped the coat at her feet, then looked around again, picking up a small hessian sack. “Maybe you are guard, and I am your prisoner.” She pulled the sack over her head, made a sound, and pulled it up again so it sat on top of her head. “It smells of…” her nose wrinkled, “cabbage.”

Sarah snorted with laughter.

“You’ll live,” she said, picking up the green coat and handing it back. Helena grinned and put it back on, hugging herself for a moment, then fiddling with the sack, pulling it through the loop of her thumb and forefinger.

Sarah looked around the decks, momentarily tempted to just take one of the gunboats and fly off with Helena. But that would mean letting down Daisy - and the Vox, of course - and she doubted that Helena would let her at this point. She was becoming more invested all the time, and Sarah was - she looked at Helena again, scrunching the sack up and smelling it again with a frown.

She’d barely been around Sarah for a day or so, and had gone from a shut-in to a girl who kills people with a wave of her hands, with powers that actually scared Sarah a little.

Not that she admit it. Anyway, who was she to judge? Plenty of blood on her own hands.

Finding a guard the same size was easy, pulling the uniform off the body was harder than she’d thought. The dead can’t undress themselves. She rolled her street clothes up and stuffed them into her satchel.

“C’mon then, let’s head over.” Sarah pulled out her Sky-hook, and Helena followed suit after making sure she still had her hair ribbon in her curls.

It was only slightly nerve-wracking, walking up the front stairs of the impound under the gentle humming of the human-shaped gun turret. Sarah kept an eye on it as they passed, waiting for the green light of the eyes to turn red, but the blank face just passed over them, and then they were through the front door. There was a wide hallway with storage rooms on either side, and another set of doors ahead.

Sarah took a deep breath, steadied her twitchy legs, and hissed ready ? to a muffled uh-hm from under the sack now covering Helena’s face. Her hands were tied behind her back - Sarah had made sure they were loose enough for her to wriggle out of quickly enough, if needed.

Although, it wouldn’t surprise her if Helena was as much of an escape artist as a lockpicker...she could probably teach Houdini a thing or two. Sarah took a breath, and pushed her way through the doors, dragging Helena after her.

There were uniforms everywhere - ahead through a long window, upstairs along the balcony, bustling in and out of the several offices. There was an underlying sense of panic held in check, and Sarah couldn’t help but smirk a little, knowing that she and Helena were responsible for some of that panic. She felt Helena take a tiny step to the left, and looked that way to see a sign that read ‘Holding Cells’ pointing down a flight of stairs. So she went that way. A few guards threw her curious glances, but they seemed to be more about her faceless prisoner than her. Sarah just kept walking.

Should’ve just mugged the first guard I saw in Columbia, she thought wryly, coulda waltzed through the city and into the tower in this uniform…

There was a tired looking man shuffling papers on a desk at the bottom of the stairs. When Sarah started talking, he just waved her through the next door.

“You’re in luck, there’s still one cell empty,” he said to his papers. “Should just shoot ‘em all, if you ask me. Save us some space, and time.” He sniggered, still not looking up, which was just as well because it meant he couldn’t see the look on Sarah’s face. She could feel the tension in Helena’s arms, and steered her through the door and down another flight of stairs, these wooden and narrow. There was no one down here but the handful of people in the cells, who looked at Sarah - or rather, at her uniform - and turned away. In one of the cells, two bodies lay on the floor attracting cockroaches. A step further and the smell hit her.

“Oh...jesus,” she mumbled, covering her mouth and nose with a hand, as she pulled at Helena’s bonds with the other. Helena lifted the bag off her head and screwed up her face.

“How can they just...leave them down here?” she asked Sarah angrily. The living inmates were looking at them again now, trying to figure out why this guard was letting her prisoner go. “When the Vox get their weapons. They’ll stop all this. Won’t they?” She tugged at her sleeves so they covered her hands and looked at Sarah pleadingly. “Daisy can make a change?”

“Helena...look.” Sarah had turned around to see the storage space opposite the cells, piled high with the machinery from Chen Lin’s shop, and stacks of other confiscated Vox weaponry and propaganda. She chewed on her lip. “How are we gonna get this back? Shite…” Her hand found her satchel and she sighed, pulling out her clothing to change back into. “We didn’t really think this through…” She glanced at Helena, who tilted her head, then pointed.

There was also a tear.

The air shimmered around the machinery; the flickering tear exposed an empty space.

Sarah stared, then said,

“Well, if the tools aren’t here...they must be -”

“Back at the shop,” finished Helena, fingers curled around her coat cuffs. “Sarah, I...if we go through another tear. I don’t think I can bring us back.” Her eyes gazed at something over Sarah’s head, lips trembling slightly, and Sarah knew she was thinking of those dead/alive guards back in Finkton. But then something in her expression hardened, and she nodded jerkily.

“Let’s go.”

“Just lemme get changed first, yeah.” Sarah muttered, shimmying out of the blue trousers and jacket, and pulling back on her own. The prisoners kept their eyes to themselves, but Helena smiled at her boxer shorts and vest. Cheaper than the usual women’s garments, and a lot more comfortable too, Sarah always said. As she pulled her own jacket back on and knotted the tie loosely, Helena stepped closer to the tear. It flickered again, expanding until they could see the other room clearly. Sarah craned her head around, and grinned a sharp-toothed grin when she saw the empty cells. She nodded at Helena.

“Do it,” she said, and Helena held her hands out, brow furrowed in concentration. The tear wobbled, widened, the floor vibrated, and Sarah could hear the prisoners alarmed voices behind her. They weren’t making enough noise to attract attention from upstairs, preferring to take their chances with this mysterious phenomenon rather than risk another beating.

The air hummed and Helena spread her hands out, yanking them apart with a small grunt. The tear widened again, but instead of snapping shut after they stepped through, it kept expanding outwards until it disappeared, and they were standing in a place that was the same but entirely different.

That was a far cry from last time , Sarah thought, maybe she’s gettin’ stronger.. . A sharp pain bloomed in her temples and she staggered, reaching out for a wall to lean on, but finding Helena instead and grabbing at her arm.

“Sarah!” Helena slid an arm around her and held her up while she rubbed her head. The pain faded and Sarah blinked.

“I’m alright. Bloody hell.” She stood up straight . “That was…”

“Hmm,” Helena hummed in agreement. “It feels. Easier.”

For you, maybe, Sarah thought, and touched her fingers to her head again. She still felt a little...odd.

The space that had contained Chen Lin’s machines and tools was instead stacked with crates labeled CONFISCATED! Weapons with red fabric wrapped around the stocks and grips lay about the floor. As Sarah had spotted, the cells were now empty, and there was the faint sound of roaring voices in the distance, punctuated by gunfire. The last cell still had two bodies in it, but they were guards. The wall above them was daubed with red paint (at least, Sarah hoped it was paint), that said THE FOUNDERS WILL BLEED. She double checked her gun, and what she had left in the satchel - ammo, some apples (which hadn’t been in there before, she was certain), all the other bits and pieces.

There was a low whine, then the building shook a little, dust falling from the rafters. They both looked up, then at each other.

“Sounds like we did something,” said Sarah, combing her hair back with her fingers. “I hope it was the right thing,” she added under her breath. Helena glanced at her, smiled lopsidedly.

“Sarah, if the Vox get their weapons? They’ll have a revolution. And Columbia will be a better place.” She sounded very certain. Sarah wished she could be that certain.

“Yeah. And we’ll get our airship and get out of here, go to New York…” Sarah faltered, squeezed her eyes shut. “I mean, London.” She felt a little distracted, like she was being subtly pulled in different directions.

“After we visit Rachel,” reminded Helena, pulling at a curl and twisting it around her finger. “I can’t believe. Surely she doesn’t really…” she shrugged and headed towards the stairs, jaw set.

Sarah followed, listening to the sound of voices and explosions grow louder as they went upwards. The desk was no longer occupied, and now there was a pile of voxophones covering it. She paused and looked over them, lifting a few and reading the labels dangling from the short needle arms.

“These are all Daisy Fitzroy,” she stated, and pressed the little lever on the top one.

You ever see a forest at the beginning of a fire? Before the first flame, you see them possums and squirrels, running through the trees. They know what’s coming. But the fat bears with their bellies full a’ honey, well -- you can’t hardly wake them up from their comfortable hibernation. We’re going to Emporia. And then, we gon’ see what it takes to rouse them from their slumber.

Sarah frowned, rapping her knuckles on the desk.

“Emporia?” She looked at Helena.

“Oh, that’s the shopping district. Very -” she twirled a finger, “ - fancy.”

Sarah nodded and picked up another voxophone.

When you forced deep underground, well -- you see things from the bottom up. And down at the bottom of the city, I saw a fire burning. A fire's got heat aplenty, but it ain't got no mouth. Daisy...now, she got herself a mouth big enough for all the fires in Columbia.

She found herself smiling at the sound of Daisy’s voice, the restrained anger as familiar to Sarah as her own face. Looking over at Helena again, she thought my own face.

Helena cleared her throat, and Sarah realised she’d been staring at her. She scratched her scalp, and grinned crookedly, then pointed upstairs.

It was eerily quiet in the building just above them. All the noise was coming from outside. And when Sarah and Helena reached the top of the stairs, they saw why.

Bodies littered the floor - mostly in blue uniforms, but some in the dull colours of the Vox, bright red sashes hiding the blood. The shouting from outside was louder now,

THE VOX THE VOX THE VOX

and another explosion rocked the building. Red banners hung over the mezzanine, over the doors, like giant splashes of blood against the walls.

“Sounds like your revolution is already happening.” Sarah said, craning her neck to see upstairs. Just more bodies and banners. Helena moved over to her, sliding a hand into Sarah’s.

“We need to go. Check on the Lin’s.” she said, and tugged, “Come on.”

The short corridor to the outside doors was littered with huge round spiked balls, sea mines? Sarah thought fleetingly, how’d they get them up here, then they were through the doors and overlooking the remains of a battleground.

There was shouting and flashes of gunfire from the Sky-lines, and more bodies - bodies everywhere. The small gunships were covered with them. Sarah wondered if the guards they had killed in the other Columbia were still down there, twice dead. Great red banners flapped from every building. Fires burned behind broken windows.

Sarah felt a twisted sense of satisfaction, and then anger for the people down in the streets. Revolutions were all well and good but innocent people always got caught in the crossfire.

“Shite.” She pulled the Sky-hook out of her belt. “Helena, be careful, yeah? Lotta bullets flying around.” She leapt, and the Sky-line carried her back down to the gunships, Helena a few feet behind. They ran up the stairs, around the corner, and almost straight into a guard in blue. Sarah reacted instantly, her hands moving in unison to stun him, then shoot. The body fell at their feet, and, much to Sarah’s shock, Helena spat on it.

She’s changing with every jump, Sarah thought, am I? Is there another me?

They made their way down the narrow winding street, passing empty shelters and small fires. There was shouting up ahead somewhere and less gunfire than before. The stocks were still empty, but a young girl sat between them, frizzy hair peeking out from under a flowered scarf and teeth shining against her dark skin as she sang.

“Some folks are born silver spoon in hand

Lord, don't they help themselves, oh

But when the taxman comes to the door

Lord, the house looks like a rummage sale, yes

It ain't me, it ain't me, I ain't no millionaire's son, no

It ain't me, it ain't me; I ain't no fortunate one, no, no

Yeah, yeah

Some folks inherit star spangled eyes

Ooh, they send you down to war…”

The two of them paused for a moment, taking in the fearlessness of the girl, and the beautiful timbre of her voice, before Sarah snapped her fingers in recognition.

“That’s the song we heard through the tear!” She laughed. “Sounds different.” There were no loud guitar sounds, and the style was bluesy rather than...whatever that other sound had been. In the background, red banners flew and fires raged and people screamed. But she kept singing, and Sarah found it hard to tear herself away. But Helena tugged at her hand impatiently, so the made their way back to the street that led to the elevator, passing more red flags and hastily made up posters of Daisy Fitzroy with the slogan JOIN THE VOX splashed across them.

A Vox fighter hurried past, barely giving them a glance, only to stop and backstep to look at Sarah. Her eyes lit up.

“You’re Sarah Manning, hero of the Vox!” she exclaimed, grabbing Sarah’s hand and enclosing it in her own to shake it. Sarah looked back at her blankly.  “We’re heading up above,” the woman called over her shoulder as she resumed her errand.

The headache returned with a vengence and Sarah winced slightly. Helena helped her walk to the end of the street, where a crowd of the Vox were shouting and thrusting guns into the air.

“What the hell…” Sarah muttered, squinting up at the giant poster above the plaza. It was her. It was definitely her, fist in the air, a gun in the other, hair streaming behind her. SARAH MANNING, it read, MARTYR OF THE REVOLUTION. She felt woozy.

“Wait...martyr?” she mumbled. Beside her, Helena gently removed her arm, and moved so she was holding onto Sarah’s shoulders instead, looking into her face.

“Sarah.” she said softly. “Your nose is bleeding.”

Sarah lifted a finger to her face. It came away bloody. She spoke slowly as images came to the surface of her mind.

“I remember...we...Daisy and I...burnt down the Hall of Heroes...I led the Vox here…” She dug her fingers into her scalp, pulled at her hair. “It’s like I have...two memories.” The poster still hung there. “I need a drink.” She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. The headache retreated.

Helena pulled on her bottom lip, then nodded.

“I think. You died here, Sarah. The Vox think you’re a martyr. A hero.” Her hands fluttered until she tucked them back up in her sleeves.

Sarah snorted.

“They need a better class of hero, then.”

They made it across the plaza, Sarah keeping her head down, not wanting to be recognized, and walked into the Graveyard Shift. It was empty now (of the living, at any rate), and Sarah walked straight up behind the bar and grabbed a bottle, tipping it up so the bourbon flowed down her throat. It seemed to have the desired effect of drowning the other memories, and she leaned on the bar, took another short slug, then replaced the lid. She looked to the left and noticed a passageway.

Placing the bottle on the bar, she went through the doorway and followed the passage to some stairs, stumbling down them in the dim light. They led to a cellar, and there was some scrambling sounds and hushed voices. As she stuck her head over the bannisters, she caught the tail end of a child crawling into the straw under the stairs. Then Helena called out,

“It’s alright! We won’t hurt you.” She pulled at the strap of Sarah’s satchel and dug into the bag, pulling out the apples. When she reached the bottom of the stairs, she said out loud, “I’ll just put these here. On this barrel.” Then she clasped her hands behind her back, humming, and walked away. Some furious whispering ensued from the straw.

Sarah ignored it, walking around the cellar until she found a voxophone in a dark corner. It had her name on it. Somehow she wasn’t surprised. She stared at it for a moment, then pressed the lever.

“Bring us the girl, and wipe away the debt.” As plans go, I'd seen worse -- except this girl was already gone. Monument Island's a bloody ghost town. Seems like they evacuated her when they heard I was here. Was told Sister Rachel spirited her off to that fortress of hers. As an easy job, this just went from bettin' on the river to...drawing dead. But then there’s the Vox. Gotta say -- they’re loaded up good. Problem is, I got to help them with their damn revolution first...then we take Comstock House by storm. I do that, I get the girl.”

Sarah’s mind swirled. She’d come looking for Helena, but joined up with the Vox instead. She’d died before getting to her. She lifted her hands and turned them over and over. She had been here, and now she was dead, but she was here again, and… Helena put a gentle hand on her shoulder.

“It’s alright, Sarah.” She took the voxophone out of Sarah’s unresisting hands. “She isn’t you.” She pulled Sarah close, wrapping her arms around her, rubbing her back soothingly. Sarah closed her eyes and let herself be comforted, pushing the false memories back down, down, down. She didn’t protest as she was led back up the stairs into bar, pausing only to grab the bottle, and then out into the plaza and up the street to catch the elevator back up to Finkton. As they walked in silence, Daisy Fitzroy’s voice played over the P.A system.

Sarah Manning died for this day! It was she who spoke with one voice of the people! Now is the time to stand true to her cause! To our cause! Now is the time for Fink to fall! To the factory! Let the mighty be laid low! For the people, for Sarah Manning, and the true voice! We're going to the factory -- and we're not just gonna burn it down! Only way to be sure is to pull it up from the roots!

Sarah laughed, bitterly.

 “Bloody hell,” Her voice cracked. “Daisy sure knows how to put a shine on shit.”

Helena frowned at her.

“But she’s right. About you, Sarah. You are a hero. You saved me .”

“Not in this world,” Sarah said moodily, refusing to shift her eyes from the concrete below her feet. “And not even...I mean, what if we never make it out of here?” They’d reached the elevator and she slammed her fist against the button. There was still a lot of noise behind them, but she ignored it. When the lift arrived, she stepped in and leaned against a wall, arms crossed tightly, while Helena chewed on a thumbnail and darted glances at her.

They rode in silence all the way back up to Finkton.