Kasia made it home, dazed and caked in filth. It was early morning. She crept into the wash corner and doused herself in freezing water, keeping quiet, taking care to get all the blood out.

  Eva would have spent the night alone. The realisation struck Kasia with guilt. She had to make amends. Since Eva’s birthday approached, and money was better, Kasia swore to make if the best one yet.

  Thirteen.

  She sat on her bunk, too shaken to sleep. Terrorist faces haunted her; being caught red-handed never rang more true.

  And those terrorists killed for less.

  If that happened, how would Varma respond? Would he find her a disposable wartime casualty, or something significant? Would he feel sad? His praise rose high amongst all the day’s insanity. She remembered every word of it.

  Few people alive can say they fought back against Opus Veda. For the third time you’ve proven yourself under duress Katarzyna.

  Kasia would give him a fourth, and as many more as it took. She was advancing, she was handling danger, and she was good at it.

  Luca. Shot by a hunter with eyes like knives, vulnerable in a hospital and possibly in the hands of someone worse. She had messaged Sermon for an update; her message was unread.

  She could only think about any of this because a scabby vagrant girl helped her. Who else in those midnight tunnels had?

  As if in response, white masks twisted and leered. Kasia rubbed her eyes, writhing in a bed without the space to handle it. From the bunk above Eva stirred, daring to wake up. Kasia settled. She wasn’t in a mothering frame of mind.

  Her phone illuminated her face in an otherwise dark room. She caught up with friends, indulging in their concerned messages now she was, for the first time, consistently offline. She spent the rest of her time on ‘Vijiwiki’, an uncomfortable corner of the dark web, collating all that was known on Opus Veda.

  Sermon liked an update on Kasia's profile. Her heart leapt. He must have made it home. She liked his like, and waited for him to invite her over.

  “Hey, grab a sofa.” Sermon chuckled half-heartedly and beckoned her into his flat.

  “Nah, let’s go on the roof. Actually…” Kasia scanned the balcony and rubbed her shoulder, “you got a fag on you?”

  He nodded without challenging it. After the day they’d been through, she had an excuse. Still, whilst she wasn’t looking, he chose a nicotine-free vape.

  They climbed to the roof and dragged from copper tubes. Traffic washed around them, as it had every night of their lives, only made aware to them at thoughtful moments like this. They watched the skyscraper jungle across the river, the scrolling adverts around each tower, but it was hard to understand what they meant. Fog was rolling in. The rainy season was due.

  “Kurwa how much nicotine is in this?” Kasia spluttered on her vape and tried to downplay it. Sermon smirked.

  “3 milligrammes. Don’t take it down all the way or you’ll mess your lungs up,” he blew an effortless ring of steam across the river, “well what a shit day...”

  "Yea..." Kasia gave up on her vape and toyed with it, “is Luca fine…”

  “Think so. Desk-bitch on the ward said he’s stable anyway…” Sermon forced himself to confront a question he didn’t want answered, “you reckon he’s safe in there yea?”

  Kasia thought about Varma’s parting truth; Pierce’s baffled rage that Luca had gone. She didn’t want the question answered either.

  “I reckon he’ll be fine, but I wonder if the Reds can cover the fees. Ain’t gonna have health insurance are they?

  Sermon didn’t respond. Kasia scraped the floor with her shoe.

  “You’re close to him…”

  “I dunno man; we’ve been holdin’ back a bit and…” Sermon swatted the air, “I’m bein’ stupid ain’t I!? No such thing as romance any more, been reminded it enough.”

  “Yea but he’s warmer than most people, he's probably holding back to be professional. He’s got Pierce above him right?”

  “You sure it’s just that?”

  “For sure! When you both get off duty, he’ll be hanging off ya like a baby Kangaroo.”

  Sermon snickered. Kasia took the moment to brave more intimacy.

  “The Captain was at the base,”

  “Oh yea?” Sermon pinched his chin and grinned, “well?”

  “He asked us to go over what happened-”

  The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  “No not that! Him.”

  Kasia folded her arms.

  “You don’t ‘ave to be ashamed of likin’ someone sista.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t tell me who I fancy!”

  “Alright alright….” Sermon tutted, drew from his vape, and waited, “oh but come on just this once! It’s well obvious!”

  “Whatever…” Kasia turned away sulking, “I’ll see if there’s a revolutionary porn avatar or something.”

  “Never as good as the real thing.”

  “Half of something beats all of nothing-”

  “No it doesn’t-”

  “Yes it does, and besides,” Kasia turned back to him, “there is no real thing.”

  “Your boss at Riese shags all his goons - even pudgy little Leah! Why can’t Varma?”

  “Isn’t that exploitation?”

  “Any more than a night club?” Sermon made a fist and shook it, “let’s have a double date with him and Luca!”

  “Spierdalaj... Can you imagine bringing them round here? What’re we gonna do with them, share a magnum under Little Kendi?”

  “We could go round theirs!”

  “Kensington Palace?”

  They paused, then laughed, amazed at the madness they’d fallen into. Kasia disengaged her vape and tried to give it back, but Sermon waved as if to say ‘keep it’. He sighed and scratched his forehead.

  “To business Kash; about our future with the Reds. I know I pushed you before but, If you don’t wanna go back I’d get ya. They never said terrorists would be involved-”

  “I've already thought about it. If they let me, I’m staying.”

  Another pause, “you sure it’s a good idea?”

  “Have you ever heard of Opus Veda harming a child? Trust me, I checked. Eva’s safe, and that’s the only thing now that’d make me quit.”

  “I like this fightin’ talk sista! Where’d this confidence come from?”

  Kasia pondered. There were lots of reasons. Money. Skill. Recognition. Impressed Captains. Probably something political too, but whatever.

  There was something else. A step forward, taken weeks ago, made clear only today.

  “I have this recurring nightmare, about my mum. I’m trapped in my old bedroom as she leans in from the ceiling, snarling at me. I’m screaming at her, but I don’t understand the words I'm saying, and when I look up, all she does is laugh. I can’t get out, until I wake up.

  I haven't seen her in 16 years, but I bet you there hasn't been a week where I haven’t had that nightmare,” Kasia smiled softly, her brow raised, “until now… I joined that revolution, and all my dreams went. It’s like all my ghosts became ancestors.”

  She felt along her sleeve, every line she had cut into herself. For all she had faced with the revolution, none of it ended with her losing blood. Only the blood of others.

  She stopped herself, fearing she had gone too far. Too much intimacy. Too taboo. Sermon nodded seriously and went to put his arm around her, but that could be misread, so he backed down.

  He lightly punched her on the arm. She nodded her thanks. They went their separate ways.

  * * *

  Ali was having a bad month. It showed in her sleep, her posture, the puffiness under her eyes. People were starting to notice.

  She tried counselling, and reminded herself why she’d abandoned it before, in the wake of a drunk husband’s fists. Whilst medical science raced to new heights, therapy and psychology drowned in the same bullshit factory as ever; a counterfeit science of empty platitudes, told over and over, until their belief became obligation. Make time for yourself. Notice when your thoughts spiral. Pithy quote A. Pithy quote B. This. That.

  If the words were empty and ineffectual, Ali had heard them. Live laugh love?

  Go get fucked.

  None of it worked. And the last therapist - an overacting fop with an overwrought qualification - had ended Ali's patience with the emptiest words of all; the apparent answer to every problem in the world.

  Practice mindfulness. That mantra stuck to the world’s problems like a fly on shit.

  Mindfulness didn’t stitch civilisation together. Women like Ali did.

  She panned the kitchen over her desk and scrolled to the drinks cabinet. Anything she wanted was dry; left behind was a sorry selection of liqueurs intended for cocktails she never made, for parties with friends she couldn’t meet offline. She could get a delivery, but the minimum order would have her searching for groceries to add. She couldn’t be bothered.

  She flopped forward and rested her cheek against the desk, accidentally pressing the menu still projected over its polished surface.

  “I’m sorry, we are out of that. I can instead recommend: Kahlúa-”

  “Fuck off kitchen.”

  The menu panned away with a descending tone. Ali grumbled.

  Little footsteps approached her office. One of her daughters. Monty peered from his bed and prepared to bark. Ali smirked and wound out of her chair.

  “Why aren’t you in bed, Opal?”

  Opal toddled forward, doll in hand, bottom lip sticking out.

  “Tiffany keeps scaring me...”

  “For goodness sake Opal don’t be silly. What’s the matter?”

  “Tiffany told me, uhm, the people who came to see us were terrorists,” Opal sniffled, “she said they’ll come back and... pick my face off...”

  Ali grinned and folded her arms. She needed to stop letting Tiffany off, but she couldn’t help having her favourite sometimes.

  “Your sister's just upset with what happened. That awful woman really hurt her, and all you did was stop and have a chat!”

  “Tiffany made her do it!”

  “Do not defend them!” Ali snapped, making Opal jump. She calmed down and knelt, holding her youngest by the elbows, “listen to me: people like that woman envy us no matter how nice they seem sometimes. If you give them anything it will never be enough until you have nothing left.”

  Opal pouted and shook her head dramatically, “she was nice until Tiffany bullied her...”

  “If you insist. Maybe one day you’ll learn the hard way: even the best of them turn on you given the chance…” Ali sighed, and patted Opal's cheeks, “but I'm not going to let any terrorists get you, they'll have to beat me first. Go to bed. Now.”

  Opal squeezed her doll and left, shooting a glare at Monty on the way. Monty hopped backwards and growled, until Ali warned him off.

  She returned to her desk and stared into nothingness. The house read her expression and loaded the data she'd gathered on her tenants, the profiles of Katarzyna Szymanska and Sermon Mkenda. The more she learned about them, the more it angered her they’d dared visit.

  The one she wanted most was more coy. Imany Eshun. Suspiciously offline, but Ali still had enough. The detectives had been slow, and condescending. But they’d given Ali what she needed all along.

  An excuse.

  Time to fix things herself, as always in life. And she had one man she could call. One with power and connections, who could, if convinced by Ali’s support, make insignificant people go away.