Fly By Night woke to sunlight streaming in her window. She blinked, disoriented, then shouted, "Shit!" and launched herself out of bed.
There was no time to search for a fresh outfit, so she grabbed yesterday's clothes off the floor. Pulled the shirt over her head, winced when she realized it was backwards, and, continuing to curse under her breath, wriggled it around to the right side. Then her overalls, socks, boots, backpack. No time to do her hair or fix breakfast; she was already late.
The summer sun burned hot over the city of Taizhil, and Night was sweating before she'd made it a block from her apartment building. She didn't slow down. Today was a make-or-break day, and she'd already screwed up by oversleeping. Her twin sister, Bells Across the River, would be heartbroken and furious if she botched this opportunity.
It had been months of waiting, first for Night's proposal to pass through her work group, then the floor reps, and finally to the building chief. She'd defended her pitch to him, countering every doubt, answering questions about every minute detail of her design. In the end, he'd dropped the stern demeanor and smiled warmly at her. "I'm gonna pass this on to the union organizers at the next meeting. Be prepared to present to them in a month or two. I'll let you know when I've got a date for you."
Night broke into a run, feeling her backpack bounce heavily against her. She tightened the straps down without losing speed. The prototype she carried was sturdy, but it was too precious to take chances with.
The 51st Manufacturers Union office was across town from Night and Bells' apartment. It was only a half hour trip since the transport guild had gotten the rail lines running, but Night's appointment was in 20 minutes. "Shit, shit, shit," she muttered to herself, pushing even faster. Night was strong, but her endurance had always left something to be desired, and soon she was wheezing as she ran. Heat radiated off the concrete below and around her, but she didn't stop until she made it to the rail station. She swung onto a train just before the doors closed, and sat down, chest heaving.
Night and Bells were not city people by nature. They'd spent most of their childhoods in the wastelands on the peninsula to the east of the city, which people inexplicably called The Verdant Coast. The only verdant thing about the peninsula was the faint green tinge the sky sometimes got around sunset, as the fading light filtered through copper particulates. But it had been home to the sisters, along with their mother, their mama, and their xixi. They'd been a family of scrappers, traversing the peninsula in an an ancient hexapod AV. The girls had grown up exploring crash sites and old battlegrounds, or else sheltering inside their walking home when the radiation got too strong.
Years later, the day everything changed still took up most of the room in Night's head. Bells and Mama, the explorers of the family, had gone out early to investigate a scattering of space debris that had fallen recently over Izya Territory. Debris falls were exciting - they rarely yielded any usable parts, but some of the junk up there had been made from metals that had become rare in the intervening centuries.
Bells and Mama had been out of comm range when the radiation storm kicked up. It was always a risk in the Verdant Coast. Everyone in their family had a homemade radiation suit, and they all knew how to build a fallout shelter from scavenged materials. So Night hadn't worried, at first. But the storm had continued, and the geiger counters only kept going up. Eventually they'd decided to risk moving the hexapod through the crash site in search of their missing kin.
Mama and Bells had holed up in a makeshift shelter. When the storm hadn't abated, Mama had taken off her own suit and wrapped Bells up in both of them. By the time the hexapod found them, she was already gone.
Bells made it through, but the radiation had penetrated her double layer of protection and sunk deep into her body. Mother and Xixi took her to Taizhil for emergency care, and when they found out she'd continue to need care the rest of her life, they decided to stay. It turned out to be a good thing they did. The storm had either come from or attracted some kind of beast, said to be bigger than the biggest AV and twice as deadly. For years it had made its home in the center of the peninsula, where Night's family had done most of their work. Rumor was that it had gone off north some time ago, but Night wasn't going to risk finding out for sure.
So they'd gotten jobs. Mother taught engineering; Xixi worked in manufacturing. The girls, when they came of age, followed the same paths. Night (and Bells too, she suspected) would've been happier out on the peninsula, without neighbors stomping up and down stairs or babies crying at all hours of the night. But the 51st provided good benefits, and teaching meant Bells could work sitting down. It was enough of a living that they could afford an apartment of their own, and more importantly, they could work on the prototype that Night now carried on her back.
The device generated a field of charged ions around it, quick enough to repel radiation up through the gamma spectrum and scattered enough to be safe around a human body. It was a Faraday cage you could turn on at will. The prototype was bulky, and heavy, and didn't last long. But if Night could get the union to support it, if she could get R&D funding, they could improve it. They could make it good enough and cheap enough for consumers. They could make sure what happened to Bells never happened to anyone else.
And if they lost that future because Night had overslept, she'd never forgive herself.
She was off the train the moment the doors opened. Back in the heat, her neck prickled with sweat, and her hair frizzed off her head. She looked a mess, but she didn't have time to care about that.
It was really the union's fault, she thought bitterly, as her legs began to protest against the strain of running with the heavy device on her back. They'd hardly given her any heads up about her presentation date, and Bells had already scheduled a medical exam in Yrvan the same day. She'd left before dawn to get there on time, meaning she wasn't around to make sure Night woke up - and true to her name, Night was not a morning person. She was pretty much doomed to be late.
The 51st Manufacturers Union was housed in a low stone building that had once belonged to the Jovangellians' city government, but had since been turned to offices and housing. When they'd run the Empire out of town, the workers' collectives had decided forego a new government and trust each other to do their own business, though there were neighborhood meetings each week and citywide gatherings once a month for issues that spanned different industries. Not that Night ever went. She understood machines, not politics. Bells would go sometimes, though; she had plenty of thoughts about citywide efforts, especially where education was concerned.
Night dashed up the stone steps of the building, past the imposing columns, and down the hall, skidding to a halt outside the office door. She was about to grab the handle when a tall, muscular, middle-aged woman pulled it open from inside, and started when she saw Night standing in front of her.
"Ah," said the woman, Makeda Half-Past. She was a long-standing member of the 51st, and had been elected to serve on the organizer board plenty of times. Night didn't know her well, but you couldn't work in manufacturing for long without seeing her face.
Makeda stood back to hold the door open. "Fly By Night, I'm glad you made it," she said. "We were worried we'd have to adjourn. Would you like a glass of water?"
Night doubled over, panting with her hands on her knees. "Yes, please," she managed, taking a moment to suck in air before she followed Makeda into the office. Her heart raced from adrenaline as much as exercise. She'd nearly lost her chance - but she'd made it.
The office was small, but well-kept. Most of it was contained in rolling units that served as desks, storage, and de facto work tables for whatever side project the current organizers were working on. Most manufacturers went crazy if they didn't keep their hands busy, so even when they were acting as pencil pushers, they couldn't help tinkering. Today they'd rolled out a whiteboard for Night to use in her presentation.
Makeda led Night to a chair, where she sat down gratefully, holding her backpack on her lap. Her pulse slowly calmed as she sat, and after a minute, Makeda came back with the promised water. Night tried to sip slowly, not wanting to look any more unprofessional than she already did.
When she was halfway through the glass, she set it on the desk nearest her and looked up. She saw the other organizers watching her, and blushed as she realized they were waiting on her.
She stood hastily. "Thank you for your patience," she said, feeling suddenly very small. She tried to find the confidence she'd felt defending the project to her building chief. She may not believe in her persuasive abilities, but she believed in her design. She took a deep breath.
And then the building exploded with light.