The Age Atomic

FIFTY-TWO

Black and white and blue and white and her eyes burning blue they are blue her eyes are blue cold blue the light at the end of the

Kane shook his head and found himself standing by a door in a corridor of polished grey concrete. He was awake, although he had been dreaming again. Dreaming of the woman with the blue eyes, dreaming of his old friend Captain Carson, hunched over the controls of his mighty airship as it flew towards a tall building with a silver and steel cap, like the decoration on a fancy wedding cake. He remembered Byron, who had saved him… but Byron was gone now, just a thought, an echo ringing far away. And he remembered something else, something angry and silver and fast. Something strong.

Kane blinked. The corridor was gone. He was in a room, a vast space with a ceiling so high it was invisible. He was walking between two huge ranks of robots, silver, impassive, all facing the far wall of the room.

Kane stopped, but it took effort, like he wasn’t in control of his body. He turned to the far wall and saw a street swathed in night, air as cold as a razor pouring out of it. He thought he recognized it, but perhaps he was dreaming. Soma Street was inside a room, a room full of robots, each of them facing the street, ready to…

“You.”

Kane looked up. There was a platform ahead, suspended over a huge red donut structure that pulsed with an internal light. Above the platform, a woman, floating in the air. She was blue and glowing, tethered to the image of Soma Street on the wall by tendrils of ethereal energy.

Blue and white and her eyes were blue they were blue they were blue

“I… I cannot see you,” said the woman with the burning blue eyes. “I can’t see your time.”

Kane had no idea how he had got to where he was, or where his friends were. But he felt a pull towards this woman with the blue eyes, something magnetic, electric. It was comfortable; it felt right. He took a step forward, and the woman smiled.

“You’re like me,” she said.

Kane nodded. He knew it was true. He knew that she was the woman from his dreams, that here was her army, ready to march into the Empire State, ready to end it all.

She floated down from the platform until she was almost on the floor of the chamber. This close, Kane felt alive, aware, his body sharp and real and powerful. In response, her aura flickered, growing larger, brighter, so close he could reach out and touch it.

“Come to me,” she said, holding out her arms. “Come to me and we will die together.”