EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP

Boom.

Bang.

Crash.

This was the entirety of Kae’s impressions of the exit. With her eyes firmly closed and covered and a multitude of darts, serrated edges, and wires wooshing, grinding, and twanging all around her, she was fairly sure it was best not to know what was happening.

Plus, Des’ shoulder and the arm wrapped around Kae’s legs were strangely comfortable, in a ruggedly uncomfortable sense. Kae was careful to ignore that thought and focus instead on the proximity of death. The second was easier to put into perspective.

Finally, they stopped. Des was panting, and sweat ran down her back. Her strong back, Kae didn’t fail to notice. She could feel the muscles under the woman’s coat.

“You can open your eyes." Des.

“You sure? Because all it takes is a peek, a glimpse, and we’ll be blown—”

“I’m sure. Unless the phrase ‘I heart Ancient History’ poses some sort of danger.”

Kae peeked. The cramped tunnels and general sharpness had been replaced with a nicely illuminated and pleasantly organized open space, filled with knickknacks and mementos of the museum. An entire wall was occupied with t-shirts with various humorous allusions. Behind protective glass and a safety warning against death and severe maiming, little models of the traps were in full display, each identified with a plaque and a price tag. They weren’t cheap. And right on the wall beside them, a cartoon depiction of King Mahk-Aete-Ma with rosy cheeks, a bright smile, and an upright thumb invited the visitor to come back soon.

Everything was shaking very slightly. The Wave was close.

“Honestly, I think I preferred the traps,” Kae said. “Am I—" And then she turned.

Des was standing right behind her, taking everything in with her blaster at the ready. The Guardian’s face was flush from the run, and her long midnight hair danced in curls around her face while she pulled it back in a ponytail. It looked good on her. Des was paler than Kae had realized, her eyes more intensely blue than they had any right to be. They turned to Kae.

"You alright?"

“Fine!” Kae said, pushing a strand of hair behind her ear. It was a good, good thing, that she’d been upside down for the past five minutes. It made for a convenient scapegoat for the redness climbing up her cheeks. “Fine. Good, I mean, I'm— Down!”

Des was turning was soon as she read the alarm on Kae’s face. The energy blast flew over both their heads and tore a hole through the stationary section, spreading paper sheets and overpriced pens all over the room.

“Pirates?” Des asked. She put her back against a cement wall and held the blaster with both hands, all reflex and ready professionalism.

“Yes!” Kae answered from the floor. “I thought you’d taken care of them!”

“I said I hadn’t killed them.”

“I thought you were saying that so I wouldn’t freak out!"

“Focus,” Des snapped. “See that glass there?”

Kae followed her nod to a glass-covered shelf. An out-facing book asked the world ‘Did Aliens Build These Ancient Structures?’ Somehow, Kae doubted the answer within would be no.

“I see it.”

“From here, I can see the pirates in the reflex. They’re organizing. Two armed, one went to get Shadows. That means trouble.”

“I thought this meant trouble!” Kae said. Her arms were wrapped around her hand, trying to stave off blaster pandemonium.

“Kae,” Des said. Not rushed. Not insistent. Simply direct. “You need to focus. Get yourself together.”

There was something about the woman’s voice that short-circuited any attempt to disobey. Still, Kae did her best.

“They’re gonna shoot me.”

“They can’t hit you from there and I can see them,” Des said, still calm. “If Shadows gets here, he'll pull the ceiling down on our heads and sort out the rubble later. Get up.”

It’s the confidence, Kae realized. Each word the woman spoke was like a key slotted into the action center of her brain. Slowly, Kae uncoiled, put her back against the wall and slid up. She’s perfectly in control.

Kae breathed in to try and calm herself. It didn’t work half as well as looking at Des did.

“What do you need me to do?”

“Alright,” Des said, smiling encouragingly. “See there? On the glass?”

She did. The pirates were protected behind pillars in the entrance lobby. A rear guard, left behind to make sure no one got in or out. Just as she looked, a pirate came into view and shot a hole through the poster section.

“I see them,” Kae yelped.

“Good,” Des nodded, nonchallant. “Now, do you know how to lay down suppressing fire?”

“No!”

“That’s fine. You don’t need to. It comes instinctively.”

“How can it come—”

“Listen,” Des grabbed her shoulder and looked into her eyes. “As soon as there’s an opening, you’re gonna shoot them. Shoot high, shoot low, just don’t shoot me. Got it?”

All Kae could do was nod. Des passed her the blaster, and she took it with shaking hands.

“OK. That’s the barrel,” the Guardian said gently, and then turned the blaster around and handed it back. “This is the trigger. You aim this at the pirates, and you press this. There isn’t much recoil to speak of. You’re trembling.”

“I just never killed anyone before.”

Des stopped, then patted her shoulder awkwardly.

“Honey, you’re not going to kill anyone. From this distance and with a handblaster you couldn’t hit the Wave. Just like they can’t.”

As she spoke, a beam turned a register into less than the collection of its parts. Kae noticed that someone had bothered to empty it of change before evacuating the city.

“The important thing is noise. If you make noise, they’ll stop shooting, which means I can get in close and clear the way. Got it?. Ready? Steady?”

Numbly, Kae nodded. Des smiled.

“Good girl.”

The phrase very nearly dragged a smiled from Kae’s lips. She looked down at the blaster, making sure she knew where everything was. When she looked back up, Des was gone.

Kae panicked until she saw her reflected in the glass bookcase. The Guardian was advancing between glass counters displaying postcards and erasers and pictures frames. The pirates had spotted her. They came out from behind the pillars holding blasters, taking aim…

Kae’s first shot sent a chandelier swinging and showering sparks everywhere. Kae did not see this, because the blaster had nearly flown out of her hands and she was busy wrestling it to submission. Levelling it against the surprised pirates, she yanked the trigger back again and nearly shot herself in the foot. The pirates returned fire, and Kae dived behind the wall.

Time went by in a blur. Kae was mostly aware of glass exploding around her. The cartoon king Mahk-Aete-Ma had a hole in his forehead the size of an apple, and everyone seemed to be screaming.

Until they weren’t.

Kae lifted her head slowly. The gift shop was considerably more hole-y than before, but on the upside no one was shooting at her now. A tiny sawblade rolled on the ground and wobbled to a stop. Then silence.

“Coming?”

Des walked out from behind a pillar. Kae approached cautiously, peering at corners, until she saw two pirates crumpled on the floor together.

“Did you kill them?” she asked.

“Stop asking that. Do I look like I kill people just because?” Des asked. She was barely winded. She didn’t have a scratch on her. “No. They might be concussed, but I’ll remind you they were shooting at us until a moment ago, so I think at least some concussion is warranted.”

She stepped forward and took the blaster from Kae’s shaky grasp.

“Well, you’re a Guardian,” Kae said. “They never stood a chance.”

Des looked right at her. She seemed like she was about to say something, caught between one thought and another, but then closed her mouth, shook her head.

“Let’s get out,” she ended up saying. “The Wave will be here soon.”

Eletes, the City on the River, looked placid enough, if not for the absolute, eery emptiness of its streets and the omnipresent ominous rumble. And, of course, the Wave.

It loomed over every building. It painted the sunlight blue. It was nothing and everything. Kae loved and hated the Wave. It was awful how easy it was to get lost in the patterns, the fancies, the impossible futures.

She forced her eyes away. Des was looking down, her hands turned to fists and trembling. Kae approached her, touched her shoulder and the Guardian jumped with teeth bared and fists up. Her expression was sad and furious at the same time. The blue in her eyes sparked, ready to set fire to the world.

And then she breathed out and uncoiled.

“Come on,” Des said. “Let’s get out of here before the pirates come back.”

They walked past a large family landship painted black and with a tattered pirate flag just barely holding on to an antenna by means of string. In the cockpit, a surprised pirate followed them with her eyes. Kae hurried.

“We’re not going to outrun the Wave, are we?” Kae asked. “Because we should have started running a while ago.”

Des scoffed, but didn’t offer an alternate solution. She seemed to know where she was going, so Kae followed.

The entire street hummed, as if a giant bow was being dragged across the string of its fabric. Walking away from the Ancient History Museum, they came upon the Medros, the river the city rested on. It was sometimes given the alternate moniker of the Peaceful River, though today it looked anything but. The water looked to be boiling.

“Why’s it doing that?” Des said.

“Cymatics,” Kae said. “The Wave’s hum makes patterns on the water. It’s actually a very interesting phenomenon. I wonder if anyone’s running studies on the frequency of the hum. It could give us an insight into—”

“Believe me,” Des interrupted with a dour tone. “If a field of study exists, they’ve applied it to the Wave. Doesn’t seem to have provided a lot of useful insights, though.”

“Well,” Kae pointed across the river. “It does to some.”

There was small party on the city’s largest bridge. Anyone standing in it could see the Wave approaching without buildings getting in the way, yet no one seemed about to run away. They had brought enough boomboxes to rival the Wave itself. People danced, kissed, cried, and screamed their hearts out. Some made love, and no one seemed to mind much.

“Happening all over the Empire,” Kae said. “People who’re tired of running, who don’t think there’s any point in fighting it anymore. They just get together and throw parties and wait for the end.”

“Cowardice,” Des commented, unimpressed. She didn’t watch the party. She just kept walking with a purposeful long stride that forced Kae to skip one step for every two.

“Assuming you’re not joining the festivities, do you have a way out of here?” the Guardian asked.

“Hum, no, not really. I hitchhiked,” Kae lied.

“You hitchhiked,” Des repeated, deadpan. “Towards the city?”

They had arrived at a large, empty square, centered by a large obelisk that symbolized the Imperial something or other. Possibly its great big cock.

“Uh, yeah,” Kae said. “Listen, are we close to wherever we’re going?” she felt a little nervous. In the corner of her eye, inescapable, the Wave loomed, ever closer.

“We’re here,” Des said. She was searching for something in her pocket.

Oh, Kae realized, looking around at the empty square. Right. We’re going to die.

“Are you looking for a portal?” she asked, to fill the silence amidst Des’ cursing. “The portals are all deactivated,” Kae continued, monotone. I am going to die. It was strange to have that thought course through her mind twice in the same day. “The Wave interferes with them, or something, I—”

“It’s not a p— Hah!” Des lifted a triumphant hand. A tiny remote. She clicked it.

The air in the square wobbled, rippled, and a camouflage shield fell to reveal the most beautiful thing Kae had ever seen up close. Well. Second most beautiful.

Des looked back, sunglasses back on, smiling over her shoulder.

“Kae,” she said. “Meet Slipstream.”