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  Minerva Corporation did good work. Maybe they’d be decent and not disqualify her for trying to save another contestant’s life. They could check her system log for proof—she accessed the grid only to help Ardha.

  “Better live, asshole,” Marmeg whispered to the unmoving body. Ardha’s face was beautiful in spite of its half-bloodied, pale state.

  She stood, flexed her calves, and ran up the rocky slope. Pebbles flew behind her, drawn by gravity to whatever waited at the bottom. The Mike’s figure was a shadow crawling along the scree and struggling for purchase. Marmeg continued her swift ascent without giving it a second look.

  * * *

  Marmeg got enough of a lead on Mountain Mike that she was well out of sight before taking her bearings. Once she had her location, she pulled up her original route. It was only two miles away, which wasn’t bad considering how completely she had put herself in the hands of the Mikes.

  The moon shone overhead. The clouds had fractured into patches of fluffy gray across the sky. Stars twinkled in the gaps, crystal clear even with the lunar glare for competition. Hundreds of diamond pinpoints—more than Marmeg had ever seen. Cold settled into her, a now-familiar friend, and her spirits lightened.

  Win or lose, she’d made the only right decision. Losing wouldn’t be so bad. Then she wouldn’t have to share the contest money with people who valued an agenda over a human being. Or maybe they were only indifferent when an embed’s life was at risk. What would they have said if it had been a Mike under the crush of rock? How many Mikes died out there with no one the wiser?

  The land felt emptier with that last thought. Running into Ardha the first time had been a coincidence. If the Mountain Mikes hadn’t sought her out, she might have finished the race without seeing anyone else. The lack of humanity was strange, like an empty street with no cop cars to explain it—wrong but not frightening.

  Marmeg’s cuff alerted her to the upcoming pass. This one would take her to the finish line. She found the trail marked by cairns and followed it up an uneven set of steps carved out of the granite mountainside. The footing wasn’t difficult, but she chafed at having to climb the steps rather than simply leaping up them. That would have required functional thigh-control chips.

  She walked between looming masses of rock. The faintest trace of purplish blue colored the eastern sky. She checked her cuff: three thirty in the morning. The sun would rise in two hours, but she would reach the finish line long before then.

  The rushing noise of Rainbow Falls told her she was close. Next came fences made of rough wood to guide people and keep them on the trail, away from the cliff. And then, at last, the striated columns of Devils Postpile rose into the sky. Artificial lights illuminated the natural formation, a beacon to the contestants: the end of the race.

  The thrum of an electric generator greeted Marmeg as she loped into the staging area. She squinted against the flood of light triggered by her motion. Drone-cams perched on tree branches. The nearest ones launched and pointed their lenses at her. Zippered tents littered the area. Silhouettes stirred inside some of them, probably alerted by their drones.

  Marmeg flicked on her cuff and saw that it was three minutes past four o’clock. She hadn’t beaten the record. Apparently, no one else had either, given the lack of a welcoming committee. A shadowy figure emerged from the trees on the far side of the camp and walked toward her. Zie came into the lit area, and Marmeg recognized the blond moot from the registration booth.

  “I’m so sorry,” zie said. “I had to, you know, answer the call of nature. So, you’re the first! Congratulations on winning this year’s race!”

  The drone-cams buzzed closer, recording and transmitting the conversation. Marmeg attempted a smile as they walked to a nondescript brown tent.

  Zie unzipped the opening and called into it, “Jer, wake up! We have a winner.”

  Within minutes, all the tents had opened. People and drones spilled out into the darkness. Groggy journos snapped pictures of Marmeg. She waved away their questions while she ate an energy bar and huddled in a scratchy blanket someone handed her.

  Meanwhile, the blond—whose name turned out to be Larlou—and Jer were rapidly setting up the official Minerva booth. Ten minutes after Marmeg’s arrival, the second race contestant ran in. Keni Matsuki, last year’s third-place winner, held an arm swathed in bloody smartsuit fabric. The medical team immediately looked to zir injury.

  Marmeg’s tired mind snapped to attention at the sight of blood.

  “Hey, Larlou,” she said. “Ardha—zie okay?”

  Larlou looked up from the equipment rack.

  “Who? What are you talking about?”

  “Ardha! Sent you a message. Zie was hurt bad.”

  Larlou looked at Jer in bewilderment. “Did you hear about this from any of the support teams?”

  “No,” Jer said. He frowned and turned to Marmeg. “You said you pinged them?”

  “Not them. You. Message to race org.”

  “Well, shit, kid, why didn’t you inform zir support team?”

  “Didn’t know their address. Why didn’t you get my message?”

  “I see it now,” Larlou said. “Zie looks bad. We weren’t expecting anything urgent, so we weren’t looking at messages. I’ll go find zir team’s tent.”

  “Zie doesn’t make it, it’s on you.”

  She closed her eyes against a surge of frustration and fear. So much time had elapsed. What if they were too late? She had assumed that Ardha would be taken care of and gone by the time she arrived. Stupid and selfish not to ask about zir condition sooner.

  “Wait a minute,” Jer said.

  Marmeg opened her heavy eyelids.

  “You sent us a message. That means you accessed grid data.”

  She nodded. “Had to. Zie was unconscious. Couldn’t access through zir cuff. Turned mine off after sending.”

  Jer’s pale lips pressed into a thin line.

  Marmeg’s blood surged in anger. “What? Was I wrong? Leave zir to die out there?”

  Her stomach sank at Jer’s expression. They’d declared her the winner. Would they take it back? Could they? Most of her wanted nothing more than a hot shower and a soft bed, but her sense of justice couldn’t rest. Minerva had to do the right thing, make the compassionate call. Didn’t they?

  Jer walked away, murmuring into his cuff. Dawn had arrived in full effect. Marmeg could see his lips move, but she couldn’t read the words. Adrenaline, pills, pain-induced endorphins: all of them crashed with the break of day. The energy to worry or rage evaporated. She collapsed into the blanket on the ground and fell asleep.

  When she woke, rays of sunlight shone through the tree branches at a steep angle. Dust motes danced in the beams, and the aroma of frying eggs, bacon, and pancakes filled the air. She breathed in deeply and stretched. The cuts in her calves tugged uncomfortably, reminding Marmeg that she needed to see the medics.

  The site swarmed with people. Contestants, supporters, and journos stood everywhere, eating and talking. Drone cameras buzzed in any available air space. Someone must have noticed that Marmeg was awake, because several cams moved to circle above her, swooping down to near face level and being annoying. Worse, three actual people surrounded her.

  “How does it feel?” one of them asked.

  “Congratulations! And condolences,” said another. “For what it’s worth, plenty of people on the grid think you did the right thing.”

  “What?” Marmeg said stupidly. Her brain felt like it was filled with wet beach sand.

  The journos exchanged glances.

  “You came in first place, but they’ve disqualified you because you accessed the grid. Keni Matsuki is the official winner.”

  “Oh.”

  “Aren’t you upset? It’s looking very likely that you saved . . .” the journo checked zir cuff “ . . . Ardhanara Jagadisha’s life. People are already circulating a petition on your behalf to get Minerva to reinstate you as the winner.”

  “O
h. Thanks.”

  Marmeg walked past the baffled journos and over to the race tent.

  “Truth?” she said to Larlou and Jer.

  They looked at her apologetically.

  “The race committee disqualified you, Mary. I’m so sorry,” Larlou said. “I think you did the right thing, but they’re saying that we can’t know if you accessed any information or talked to someone who might have helped you while you were online.”

  Marmeg hadn’t done either of those, but she had taken help from people off the grid. She had cheated. How could she justify defending the win?

  “Look, kid,” Jer said, “you did your best and you did great, but you should’ve hurried back here instead of turning on your access. We didn’t know about Ardhanara until then anyway. Zie was alive when we picked zir up. Everyone knows the risk they’re taking when they enter this race. Zie did too, and frankly, the route zie picked wasn’t smart. What you did was noble, but it wasn’t too smart, either.”

  “Jer!” Larlou protested. “Don’t listen to him. If there’s enough public outcry, Minerva will force the race committee to change its mind. It’ll all come out right, Mary. You’ll see. Have some faith.”

  Words bubbled into Marmeg’s mind and floated away before she could speak. Was it better to confess the truth or play the wronged innocent? She had broken the rules—not the ones the race people knew about, but rules nonetheless. At least Ardha had survived. Marmeg hoped zie felt like an ass when zie found out who had saved zir.

  “Is there anything we can do for you?” Larlou said. “Your support team never showed.”

  “That’s because she doesn’t have one,” Jer said. His voice wasn’t entirely unkind. “I bet I know what she needs.”

  Jer reached for Marmeg’s cuff hand. She pulled it back by instinct.

  “I’m going to transfer some credit,” Jer said patiently. He looked sad. “I wish it had turned out differently, but this race is as much a publicity event for Minerva as it is any real test of ability. You handed them an excuse to keep you out of the winner’s circle. They’re going to take that as a gift.”

  Shame and anger welled in Marmeg until she wanted to scream. Instead, she thrust out her cuff while looking away at the treetops. She needed money to get home. Taking it from Jer was better than having to call Jeffy or her mother.

  “Thanks,” she mumbled, reactivating grid access on her screen so the transaction could complete.

  The amount would cover bus fare and some frugal meals. Messages cascaded in as the cuff and screen rediscovered the rest of the world. Marmeg watched as the number ticked up and then jumped and then shot toward the moon. The cuff’s buffer overflowed first, then her screen’s. Marmeg muttered a curse she’d learned from Felix and Lee’s father.

  She searched the grounds for a speck of privacy to read them, but a few persistent drones wouldn’t stop chasing her. She glared up at them.

  “Did right!” she said loudly but not shouting.

  If she was acting for the grid, she would rather play for sympathy. And she spoke the truth. Abandoning her message queue, she sat down in the middle of everything, activity swirling around her. She had yet to take off her gear.

  Marmeg gritted her teeth against a groan when she pulled off the first calf exo. She couldn’t help but wince. Someone must have noticed, because a medic was on her by the time she had the second one off.

  The medic took one look at her blood-crusted pants and motioned Marmeg to follow. Her legs were little better than jelly without the exos. She stumbled on nothing, and the medic reached out, supporting her by the elbow the rest of the way. Pitying looks accompanied them as they walked. The relative isolation of the tent provided her with much-needed privacy.

  “What the hell did you do?” the medic demanded. “It looks like you cut yourself open with a kitchen knife.”

  “Near as much. Had to swap fried chips.”

  The medic looked horrified. “Out there? By yourself? With no sterilization or anesthesia? You’re insane!” Zie shook zir head. “You’re lucky you made it this long.”

  Zie kept muttering about infection and poisoning as zie readied a tray of gleaming instruments.

  “Lie down,” zie said. “On your stomach.”

  Marmeg yelped as chilly fingers pushed around her incisions.

  “Oh, please. It must’ve hurt a lot more when you made these incisions. I can see quite a bit of swelling here, but the wound is closed. We’re better off leaving it alone. I’m going to take some blood samples to check for infection.”

  Marmeg craned her head and watched the medic draw a vial of blood. Zie placed a few drops into a row of cylinders the size of her thumb. After a minute, zie scanned each one with a handheld and frowned at the screen. Marmeg held her breath until the medic’s face relaxed.

  “Lucky girl. Your blood is clear of sepsis. You do have a mild infection, which is hardly unexpected, but it’s nothing a course of antibiotics won’t clear up. I’m going to get them from the supply box outside. Stay put.”

  Marmeg sat up. The world spun. She debated getting a few more stim pills from her backpack, but the medic returned before she’d moved. Zie carried a blister pack of antibiotics and a bottle of water.

  “Take two now and another one every twelve hours until they’re all gone. And no more stimulants.” Had zie read her mind? “You need to let your body rest and recover. Get lots of sleep, drink plenty of water, and take it easy on the legs for at least a week. No exos! I recommend seeing a surgeon at that point to reopen your calves and check the capsule placement. They might be able to reduce the scarring, too. As it is now, you’re going to end up with some ugly ones.”

  Marmeg sighed and took the first dose. The giant, bitter pills stuck in her throat, and she drank nearly half the bottle before she swallowed them.

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome. I’m sorry about the race.”

  “Same.”

  She shouldered her pack and brought up her planned return route on her cuff. A free shuttle would get her to Mammoth Lakes. From there she could catch the bus to Los Angeles.

  A winding cement path led to a rectangular building and the signpost for the shuttle. There was nowhere to sit while waiting, so Marmeg dropped her pack on the pavement and slumped beside it. Two journo drones had trailed her, but they lost interest once she stopped moving. She had thirty minutes until the next shuttle. In her sleep-deprived state, it felt like an eternity.

  The bus pulled in with a squeal of brakes that woke her from a light doze. A couple and two young children got down, and Marmeg climbed on. She took up two seats, one for herself and another for the pack, but it didn’t matter. The bus was empty except for her.

  She dozed off again, rousing only when the driver informed her that they’d arrived in town. She could smell toasted bread as she stepped off. Her stomach growled. Marmeg entered the bakery from which all the lovely, mouth-watering odors came, and ordered a bagel, toast with fried eggs, and a pitcher of orange juice. It would make a sizeable dent in the money Jer had given her.

  She sat at a table in the back corner, though there was no one to hide from except the server. The food arrived steaming. It was the most delectable meal of Marmeg’s life, and she devoured it at a pace that barely allowed for chewing and swallowing.

  “Glad you enjoyed your meal,” the server said as zie cleared the dishes away.

  “Best ever.” Marmeg held up her cuff to pay.

  “No charge.”

  “What?”

  The server smiled. “Most everyone here follows the race. A free breakfast is the least I can do.”

  “Thanks.”

  Win or lose, fame had its benefits. Marmeg made sure to bump the server’s and the bakery’s ratings on her way out.

  The bus terminal in town was small, but it was enclosed and clean, and had padded seats. Marmeg slept until her cuff zapped her awake. Time to catch the bus. She blearily joined the handful of others getting on. The driver s
topped her when she held her cuffed wrist to the credit scanner.

  “Sorry, cash only today. Scanner’s broken.”

  “Jokin’?”

  The driver shook his head. “There’s a cash dispenser inside. I’ll wait for you.”

  Marmeg kept her pack with her and limped back into the station. She swiped her cuff three times at the machine to no effect. Then she noticed the small card with OUT OF ORDER scribbled in red and taped to the top.

  “My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” she muttered, feeling a strong urge to kick the machine.

  She walked back out and asked the driver if he knew of any other machines nearby. He didn’t. When was the next bus? Not for two more days. His face crinkled with pity.

  “I’ll make you a deal,” he said. “Show me the credit balance on your cuff. If it’s enough, I’ll give you a ride. You can get me some cash at the next station.”

  “Deal,” Marmeg agreed.

  She sat and put the pack vertically next to herself. She leaned against it like an old friend and fell into a deep sleep. In her dreams, towering trees tangled with walls of granite. Rocks crashed through them, creating an avalanche of roots and soil and mangled, screaming bodies.

  “Hey,” said a gentle voice. “Got to wake up here and get your bus fare.”

  Marmeg awoke disoriented and stared at the owner of the voice: a graying man with asphalt-colored skin. Right. She was on a bus, nearly out of money, and going home a cheat and a failure. You’re wrong, Ma. God doesn’t love me.

  Every muscle ached and every joint protested when she stood and pulled on the pack. The first four steps along the bus aisle were pure agony. Then blood pulsed its way to the right places, including her brain. She wondered where they were until she saw the sign proclaiming RIDGECREST in faded green lettering. The cash machine looked even worse. At least it dispensed.

  Marmeg was tempted by the smell of coffee but decided it would be smarter to sleep. She thought of all the messages on her cuff. At the very least, she owed a note to Jeffy that she’d made it onto the bus in one piece. Then again, if the race news kept topping the feeds, he would know enough.