Prologue

There was no plan for after the assassination, nothing, except reminders to hold back one bullet for yourself; in case you were caught. Suri could see the others spaced along the rooftops on either side of the avenue, all watching the official black limousine that was just rounding the corner, the slow pace allowing the Lieutenant to wave to the gathered crowds of Models, dressed in patriotic red and black. Allowing, too, the time the rebels needed to find their aim.

Sliding the bolt of her machine gun back with a snap, she watched her commander out of the corner of her eye, two roofs away to her right. Mina caught her gaze, nodding once, and the signal spread rapidly amongst the Insects; get ready.

All eight of them kept low, pressed against the slates, watching the car draw nearer. It was obvious who the occupant was: only the General, or his highest ranking Modes were allowed to travel in limousines. Fighting the growing sensation of fear, Suri gripped the weapon tighter, feeling her courage return as her cheek touched it‘s cold surface.
This could not go wrong. If it did, the sixteen year old and her friends would be in the Hard Drive within hours. A bullet in the brain was probably preferable.

The vehicle was closer now, the spidery M splashed on the car and flags laid itself over her eyes, like blood on the walls. She watched the crowd of Elite Guards around the vehicle, their eyes scanning the crowds for trouble, guns ready in their red sleeved fists.

‘Don’t look now…’ she whispered, letting the wind that snatched at her sandy hair carry her words away. The sick excitement of blood about to be spilt rushed through her own arteries. In moments like these she could easily forget that she was a murderer and could only feel truly sorry for people who had never killed. It was moments like these that  made her nightmares bearable. They allowed her to understand the Modes, to almost understand why so many of her family and friends had been butchered; the power of death was frighteningly addictive.

Then the beautiful moment shattered. Bullets sprayed from the barrel of Mina’s gun, and the rebels waited no longer. Suri and a half dozen others pulled their triggers, each adding their own barrage to the leaden rain. In a moment the smooth black metal was punctured by hundreds of deadly missiles. Modes fell, civilians screamed and still the rebels kept shooting. When sure that no one could remain alive inside the crumpled machine, Suri dropped her gun, feeling her hands burn with adrenaline.

‘Run!’ Mina shouted order carried to her troops on the strong wind. On both sides of the street weapons fell, as the Insects turned tail. In comparison to how getting away alive was likely to be, the assassination itself had been ridiculously easy.

Knowing the surviving soldiers would be regrouping already, Suri scrabbled her way across the roof, alarmed as her trainers slid as far as the guttering.  As Grace slid down the slates towards her, Suri finally made the drainpipe. It had been hard enough getting up to the roof, now the ground seemed to shift like smoke below her, the two floors becoming suddenly much too high.
‘Suri move!’

Necessity conquering her vertigo, she swung herself out into space and, mere moments later, she let go, dropping the last ten feet to the ground. Rolling, spreading the weight of impact, Suri crawled to her feet, before slipping into the shadow of the house, recovering her breath as her best friend descended the pipe. In this world every man for themselves was the only way to survive, but twelve years of friendship were not easily abandoned, even after another two years of war.

The dark haired Grace dropped catlike beside her and they ran. The crowds that had been cheering the procession were fleeing too, as the Modes turned on them in retribution.

The girls dived among them, abandoning bullet pouches and weapons as they ran. Screams rang out from the front of the stampede, followed almost instantly by the rattle of shooting; more soldiers.

Breaking out of the gridlock in a desperate bid for air and survival, Suri heaved herself over a fence, yelling for Grace to follow,  pausing at the top to look back.

The trucks had arrived. Their black doors were yawned open, filling swiftly with people, crushingly full, before doors slammed shut like teeth, trapping dozens in that black mouth.  

‘Don’t just stand there!’ Grace punched her on the leg as she too scaled the fence. Startled from her daze, Suri leapt down, mind racing. They’re taking everyone. The soldiers knew they could not hope to pin point the rebels in all this, it would be like looking for stars behind storm clouds; so they took the whole sky.
Everyone knew the black trucks, and everyone was afraid of them: they meant death or something worse. Those inside Disappeared.

Leaping deer-like over fences and pot plants, she fled across the lawns, so many others running around her that she could not tell the Models from her own Insects in the panic. Then she saw them; the trucks were ahead of them too, at the end of the row of gardens.  

Over the last few fences she could see the crowd halting, jostling, as they realised they had no way out. Among the heaving bodies, Suri spied her leader; Mina was trapped, already as good as dead, and in a moment they would be too.

With no time to think, she grabbed her friend’s sleeve, dragging her from the melee, throwing herself and Grace against the wooden wall of a shed.
‘In!’ she shouted, ignoring her confusion, wrenching the door from it’s lock, crouching quickly in the musty darkness, as  she felt her heart pounding, as the shooting outside intensified, as she cowered among the flowerpots.