Run, Anna, Run

Run, Anna, Run What a difference a day makes.

Run, Anna, Run

My brother always seized his chances; the little girl in his shadow hungered for this quality, so different from her own caution. He lurched through life from spectacular success to dramatic failure; a seemingly endless cycle of triumph and tragedy. I, in contrast, took my time, inching my way through the multiple choice, thinking ahead and through the game.

In time, I came to see this prudence as autonomy; a solitary source of pride in an increasingly compromised life. Everything around me I shrouded in complexity but, I believed, through it all I walked my own path: the lives of others were mine to control but the course of mine was my own to determine. In this dangerous pursuit of self-sufficiency, my precision and foresight protected me, and I was rarely surprised. For those who direct the game, nothing can be left to chance.

I did not, then anticipate to find myself with only two options. I could live the life I had always lived - of greyscale compromise and endless sacrifice or - learning from my brother - step blindly into the dark, uncertain of success or of failure, but taking the chance that had come to me so unexpectedly.

In the end, as always, it all came down to who was holding the gun.

***

I am sitting on the bed watching the light from the level outside flicker on the wall opposite; one, two, one two, a syncopated beat. These irregular rays have been cast on this room for almost an hour, since the main city lights began to dim, warning that the curfew is approaching.

I am waiting in a small room that is like a hundred thousand others in this sealed and suffocating city; low ceiling, beige walls, the noise of strangers in enforced proximity above, below, around.

I am startled by the buzzer on the communicator; we talk in staccato, transmitting information in bits and pieces.

'Have you got the visas?'

'I got them.'

'We'd better get moving then. Where are you?'

'There's a problem - '

'What? What's happened?'

'I've been shot...'

It only takes a second for the world to lurch out of control.

'Anna, are you still there?'

Stalling for time, I repeat myself. 'Where are you, Avon?'

'Level 19 West, corner of 13th and 2nd.' His voice catches.

'Can you move?' He doesn't answer straight away. 'Come on, Avon! We can't hang around!'

'Yes; yes, I can move.'

'There's a service lift on that block. Take it two levels up. There's an alleyway there, behind the lift. Wait for me there. I'll be - ' Look at my watch, calculate time and distance ' - ten minutes.'

He doesn't think to ask how I know the city's secret places. 'Anna, the curfew's about to start - '

'Just wait.' And I cut the connection.

So this is the point, where the choice is made; to pull him in, or to go with him. It only takes a second, perhaps I've known for a long time that this is my only chance of escape.

I run out of the room and down the stairs, taking them two at a time. On the ground floor, I crash through reception, and the concierge yells after me that the curfew is about to start...

He is on the line contacting the security services about the curfew breaker within a few seconds; when they come they decide to search the premises and find that one room is being used by a prostitute, and arrest her and her client; they arrest the concierge too for allowing his property to be used in this way, and he ends up spending six months in jail.

...but I am out of the doors and onto level 32 North West, thinking it's safer to take the lift but faster to run, seeing the lights getting lower and knowing I have only two minutes before I really am on the run - so I do run, passing the lift where a fat little man is waiting...

The man is a lawyer, well respected and with a good practice. He goes back to his apartment, has an excellent dinner with his wife, and retires the following year to a comfortable plot on the east of the city.

...and towards a secondary stairwell I know where, here on level thirty-one, I once stabbed a girl who was going to break my cover to some men who were, thanks to my activities, desperate enough to kill me slowly and bitterly.

Three and half minutes gone. Level twenty-two. Last flight of steps, metal, my feet clattering on them. They're not good to run down, two steps are too much, one step's slightly short, and my calves are starting to ache from the awkwardness. I push open the door that lets me onto level twenty-one, at the intersection between 16th and 7th. Five blocks down, and three west. He should be there by now. Four minutes gone.

Zigzagging across the level's better since though it slows me down it means I'm ducking in and out of sight. These corridors are residential, row after row of apartments, three piled up above each other on each city level. Decent beta grade accommodation; fifteen, twenty stops from the centre of the city on the subway. A stop every other corner; east-west odd numbers, north-south even numbers. The city's well-planned - has to be, to fit this many people in.

But this time of day, the sub's not running and the levels are empty. Beta grades arrested on sight breaking curfew. Someone like me... well, I've spent a lot of time outside. And I've got clearance - though there'll come a point tonight when I can't use it any more, when I'll be outside for good. Two and a half minutes left. Turn south. Got a good clear view down the level - should see any trouble a mile off.

Reach the corner where he called me; there's the booth. Someone in there, shouting - they having as bad a night as me..?

She is so distressed at what they have said to each other that she stumbles out of the booth, unaware of what's going on around her, and walks straight into a trooper making a routine sweep along Third. She's arrested for breaking curfew and, since they always need more mutoids, ends up in the service herself.

...not my problem.

At the alley now; it's hidden, tucked away beside the service lift. Halt at the entrance, breathing ragged, leaning my left arm on the wall.

'Avon?'

Voice wavering from the running. Maybe from fear.

'Avon?' More urgency this time. Figure moving towards me. See his arm clutched across his chest. Starting to think how the hell I can get us out of here unseen, or if I should even try, maybe patch it up, wait here till curfew ends and then get out -

'You! Hold it there!'

Turn my head to look round. Should've expected it. Can't run through a city under curfew without attracting attention - god knows I've relied on that enough to pull in people running from me - but where the hell are all the stupid troopers when you need them, the ones that can't fucking fire straight? Normal circumstances I'd be glad of these two on my side.

'Come out of there.'

Raising my left hand to show I've heard; licking my lips which are ash dry, ignoring the gasp of pain of the man behind me, stretching my right hand, hidden in the shadows, to my side to reach for - a gun that isn't there...

I am never unarmed, I am never unarmed; god help me, if I get out of this alive I'll never fuck up like this again...

If they come closer, they'll see not just me but him. Can't protect both of us.

Suck breath into lungs still hurting from getting here and step into the street, ignoring the voice behind whispering my name.

'Put your hands on your head and walk towards us.'

Obedience suits civilians. They told us that in basic training, and right now I look like a civilian. Raise my arms as instructed, move towards them. Two blasters are trained on me, on my heart.

Obedient civilians are what we expect. Civilians who belt out with one arm and send a trooper flying and then break into a run are not. I've no illusions; I haven't got a chance. And I do it anyway.

'Stop! Stop right there!'

Shoot a glance over my left shoulder, see him take aim and...

Later, his written report having finally reached the desk of an undistinguished looking yet politically significant individual, he is called to account for the events of the evening; impressing his superior with his answers he is moved into intelligence; on his first solo mission he is shot in the leg and bleeds to death in a squalid room near the docks on Io.

...my fingers trembling touch the red rose unfurling across my white shirt, and I am out of time...

'Stop.'

***

In the dark, where you and I could be without deception, in that timeless place where the only mark of time is the counting of heartbeats, there is only you and I.

'Do you believe in fate?'

Brushes the hair from my face. 'I'm surprised you're even asking me that.'

'Sometimes you surprise me.'

'Only sometimes?'

'Have I offended your sense of mystery? Often, then.'

'Thank you.'

'Well, do you? Believe in fate?'

Smiles crookedly. 'I think we make our own fortune.'


***

The light flickers haphazardly on the wall; one, two, three, four. As the curfew approaches and the city darkens these uneven rays have become mesmeric.

This is a small room like many, many others in this regular, regulated city; a hundred thousand pens full of citizens.

The buzzer on the communicator sounds harshly; the conversation that follows is like code in its brevity. He has the visas, but he is shot. He is shot, but he can move. He can move, so takes the directions. He takes the directions, the call is over.

The decision takes only a second. This is the escape that has been longed for, no other chance may ever come my way ever again. But there's no guarantee we'll get out of this alive.

I pause for a second, then turn to the cabinet, open the drawer, take out my gun, and hide it in my jacket.

Then I run out of the room, crashing down the steps - and I slip, sliding down four steps before regaining my balance.

Limping through reception, I hear the concierge call out to me that the curfew is about to begin and I smile back at him.

'I'll get there in time,' I say...

He thinks for a moment about calling the security services, but doesn't. Walking through his premises later, he realizes the woman in room 29 has a client in there, and contacts security then. They arrest the woman and the council member who is paying her, and the concierge is awarded a Civilian Commendation.

...and run out towards the lift since although it is slower, it is under cover, and I can rub my ankle back into action - and now I'm standing by a fat little man waiting for the lift who is a lawyer, judging by the flash on his jacket pocket. He lets me in first. 'Hurrying to get indoors?'

'Yes, yes.'

'What level d'you want?'

'Twenty-one.'

'That's cutting it fine!'

'You're telling me.'

He hits the button for me as I work on my ankle, and I see that the lift is going to stop at four other levels before it gets to mine.

'You should be OK. Well, here's my stop.'

Level thirty. What sort of lazy bastard takes a lift down two levels? He waddles out and I decide that if the lift is stopping everywhere I should cut my losses and start running...

The lawyer heads back to an excellent dinner with his wife, and dies - probably happy - of a heart attack during the night.

...as I pass him he shouts, 'Good luck!' cheerfully, and I duck into a secondary stairway to run down nine levels of metal steps that are not quite steep enough for me to run down them comfortably, and within three levels I can feel a pain shooting up from my ankle. I can't do anything for it now, I've just got to concentrate on getting to where Avon is as quickly as possible. Seeing the painted sign on the wall for level twenty-one comes as a relief, and I push the door open, coming out on 16th and 7th. Five minutes gone.

Five blocks down, and then three to the west. I'd rather zigzag across the level but not sure I've enough time to get there. So I'm running south straight down 21/16, a long line of triple-stacked beta-grade apartments. Lights on behind blinds, everyone safely inside. Only people outside at this time of day are people like me. Seems like I've spent my whole life outside. Corner of Third, turn west.

Running like crazy past a long line of apartments. Swing round the corner, one minute left, see the booth where he called me, someone coming out of it...

She wipes her tears from her face, and stops to watch a woman run past her. Then she heads up 21/13 towards her parents' apartment, missing a trooper making a routine sweep and heading west along Third. She talks all night to her sister, and wakes in the morning feeling better. She registers her change of address, starts over.

...got a view of the street ahead, but a bad view, a bad view, he's there on the street, and there are two troopers heading towards him...

He left the alley, he left the fucking alley; I told him I was coming, I told him to wait, did he think I wasn't coming? Only thirty seconds late.

One arm across his chest where he's shot; he's barely fucking standing, barely holding that gun straight and those two troopers look pretty fucking sharp; Jesus, you get the dregs when you need back-up but not now, not when it would be useful. Avon, you need proper training to take these two on, just put the gun down and your hands up and leave this to the experts.

Gun in my hand now and firing as I'm running; one of them down now but the other, the other one has his shot out a split second before I can get out mine...

Hospitalized for two months afterwards, and then invalided out of the service, he finds it hard to adjust to civilian life, having signed on as a twenty-year man at fifteen. Eighteen months later, bloodstream full of shadow, and living in a one-room flat in the delta levels, he cuts his wrists.

'Avon!'

I run past the two bodies, fall down next to him, breath ragged, not as bad as his...

...scarlet's unfolding like petals across his shirt, his features slackening and I can't stop him slipping, slipping away...

'Stop.'

***

In that timeless place, where we count the beats and deceive ourselves, this is where if we could we would be something other than just you and I.

Watches me lie next to him. Abruptly: 'What would you do if I died?

'That's a strange question, my love!'

'What would you do?'

'What do you want me to say?'

'Don't avoid the question.'

'I wouldn't let it happen.'

Strokes the palm of my hand. 'You can't control everything.'

'I can control enough.'


***

The light flickers, one, two, one, two; the buzzer sounds; there is a cry for help. I am still, my choices made a long time ago.

Take your chances, my love. I - it seems - have a date with destiny. Chance would be a fine thing.