Iron Hood

By Meaghan E. Ward

I lean harder against the apartment wall and press a mask to a little girl’s face. Outside, ash rains on the desolate streets of Mid-level, Sector 4. The staticky hiss of the blast cannon’s recharge and the click of heavy boots echo from everywhere and nowhere.

“Did I not warn you?” the sheriff calls from the street, his tone jovial, but his words etched with steel. “There is nothing you possess that I cannot take. Your hopes. Your loved ones. Your lives.”

Beside me, Redd huddles over one child and has an arm around a second. His eyes flick from the back door to the shattered window.

We cannot stay here forever. We’ll have to make a run for it. But not yet. Not with the sheriff so close.

“I know you’re listening,” the sheriff calls. “Where are you hiding them? I’ll destroy this entire block if no one comes forward. I swear I will!”

My gaze sweeps toward Redd.

“No,” he snaps, like he knows what I’m thinking. He catches my hand and pulls me so close I see my visor reflected in his eyes. Silver and black. Iron and chrome. His fingers curl around the edge of my heavy gauntlet. It would be a surprisedly intimate gesture—if it wasn’t Redd. If it wasn’t me.

“Keep them safe,” I say, and rise into a crouch.

Red light flashes in the corner of my vision as I step onto the street. Warning: Air pollution. Reading: 349.

I swipe it away with a thought.

A vein of light seeps down between the skyscrapers. Above the brightly lit homes of the upper levels, sleek ships flash like white birds, but down here the streets are dim and blue with artificial light, and the windows and doorways are blown out and filled with darkness.

My heat sensors flick on, revealing the silhouettes of five men armed with four blast guns and one blast cannon. A light blinks above the bridge that connects Sectors Four and Five, and the sheriff stands beneath it like a self-appointed god.

“Do you think I won’t take as many lives as need be to get my answer?” he shouts.

Asphalt scuffs beneath my boots as I edge onto the bridge and into the light.

The sheriff turns. “Who are you?”

I do not answer.

“Where are they hiding the children?”

“What children?” My voice is crisp and metallic behind the visor.

“It was agreed. A child’s service to the war—seven years drafted—in exchange for canceled family debt and a clean slate. Where are they?”

The war has been going on for eight years now, and none of the children have been returned. The taxes continue to rise, and debts continue to mount. There is no clean slate for the mid-levels, and I will not be the first to concede. “They are safe and will remain so.”

One of the sheriff’s men starts forward, but the sheriff raises a hand and closes the distance himself. One stride. Two. His blast gun hums as he presses it beneath my hood. “Don’t play games with me, girl. Don’t think I won’t bleed you and dump your body into the Void.”

Below the bridge lies the Void—ground level—with its murderers and monsters, where light doesn’t reach and even powerful men like the sheriff dare not go. The heat of his gun seeps through my visor, but I stand firm.

“Go ahead,” I retort, “but I don’t envy you your audience with the king when you tell him there is no tax to be collected, because there is no Mid-level, Sector 4.”

“Give me your name,” he demands.

“Do ghosts have names?”

“You are no ghost. Shall I prove it?”

He reaches for my hood, but I break his hold. The metal plates of my gauntlet shift, winding into a crossbow. I level it between his eyes so he can see the flashing light and know that it’s armed.

I nod toward the bridge. “Tell your men to cross to Sector Five.”

Surprisingly, he does.

I punch the orange button on my gauntlet and fire. The missile flies over his shoulder.

He scoffs. “You missed.”

The bridge explodes behind him.

White-hot light flashes. The sheriff lurches into me, and we hit the ground, rolling across the pavement. I’m on my feet again in moments, but so is he, lunging at me with a roar. His blaster swings up, firing.

My left leg gives way. Wires spark beneath my synthetic skin.

I slam my thumb against the blue button on my gauntlet. The firing chamber twists. The sheriff dodges the first bolt, but I aim again, this time finding the flesh of his thigh. He raises his weapon, but my next bolt catches him in the wrist, knocking the gun from his hand.

He backs away from me. Slowly at first, then faster. Behind him, twisted steel and raining sparks are all that’s left of the bridge.

He raises his chin, but his eyes are wide and white.  “Who are you?”

Humans place so much emphasis on a name. A face, a target, a hope.

I flip back my hood so he can see the empty android visor—so he can see his fear reflected back at him. “You can call me Iron Hood.”

I jab the gauntlet buttons, and a grappler spool drops into my palm. I clip it to his belt, fire at the steel bones of the bridge, and shove him over the edge.

For a moment, all is still—as if all of Sector 4 collectively holds its breath, watching and waiting as the sheriff dangles below, screaming my name into the darkness over the Void.

Redd emerges from the dust, reaching for my elbow. “You shouldn’t have done that. He’ll never stop coming for you now—for us.”

“Let him come.” I raise my hood. “You didn’t create me to cave to tyranny.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Meaghan Ward is an author and freelance illustrator with a passion for storytelling. She lives in the mountains of Colorado where she haunts the local library and daydreams of what would happen if she stumbled into a fantasy world. She also enjoys in-season portal hunting.

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