Shall Machines Divide the Earth by Benjanun Sriduangkaew (list of e readers txt) 📕

before I catch the visual—Ouru. I don’t have enough scouts left to replace those, but I can now approximate zer location and trajectory. Not coming my way but moving to the center. Ze lacks my recon tools and, most likely, means to find a spot near the gazebo where ze can snipe down any approaching opponent.

The child stumbles behind me. Hefting her up I put her on my back and say, “Hold onto me. Your legs too.” To my fortune, the child weighs no more than fifty kilos. Practically featherweight and my hands remain free. Still she adds bulk and disturbs my balance. Not my first time with a small person slung on my back, all the same. I keep up my pace, staying beneath the cover of foliage and slanted boulders.

Recadat’s scouts spot a duelist sighting me down. I duck—the child slides off me; she’ll be safe enough on the ground—and return fire. Bullets ping off stone.

Ouru chooses that moment to fry my swarmers, shutting down my view of the gazebo. I swear through my teeth, but I’ll soon be there—

Daji’s roses blaze in the corner of my vision. Detective. Get out of there. Now.

I don’t ask questions; she would not send a message like this without cause. I hoist the child into my arms and start running back the way I came. A shot cracks above me and another; one grazes my shoulder but I don’t slow down—the time for assessing damage will be later. For now the point is to have a later.

My trajectory is not ideal. I stare down a crumbled walkway and take a running leap, landing on the other side more heavily than I’d like: the floor dents and the tiles creak.

I’m clear of the arena, ninety meters out, when light lances down the sky. The orbital strike is surgical. The heat of it singes my cheeks and buffets my hair; when it is over afterimages strobe across my retinas.

On the ground the child stirs and twitches. It is when her gaze clears and she starts screaming that I realize I have been carrying a flesh-and-blood creature, human and not an AI proxy after all. In the Divide module, the count of duelists has dropped to eleven.

Wonsul’s Exegesis picked up the child before I departed Cadenza; her parents had agreed, evidently, to sacrifice her to the contest in exchange for accelerated entry into Shenzhen Sphere. So much for the nobility of parental love. Still, the girl’s alive; sometimes that’s all you can ask for.

Unfortunately the overseer does not agree to hand me an override even if I’m the de facto winner. Recadat is safe, if shaken. Nothing quite like this has happened so far during this round of the Divide. She stayed behind in Cadenza to see if she can find out who engaged the Retribution command.

The graze on my shoulder proves merely cosmetic, an unlovely scratch on artificial shell but nothing more, and I return to Libretto without incident.

Once I’m in the Vimana suite I breathe more easily—it is a false illusion, but habit situates the human mind to regard a base, a temporary residence, as refuge. I toss my coat aside and settle down on a divan.

Daji glides behind me, sliding cool hands onto my shoulders. “I can almost smell your adrenaline,” she says in my ear. “It’s piquant. Welcome home, Detective.”

I inhale—Daji smells of roses and pomegranates. Olfactory emitters, customizable to any fragrance. From my pocket I bring out the box from the antique shop. “This is for you.”

A rustle as she removes it from its paper lining. “Close your eyes.” I comply; after a few seconds she murmurs, “Now open them.”

I do to the sight of Daji kneeling between my legs, dressed once more in that scantiness of pelts and petals. The fire opal gleams between her collarbones, embedded into her chassis. It looks right at home, complementing the shades of her flower-and-fox raiment. She has placed one of her hands on my thigh. Her other holds a prosthesis—mine; she must’ve been cataloguing the contents of my suitcase.

“Let me,” she says, “take care of you.”

My breath hitches. She is right that I’m still fresh from the fight, blood coursing with the near-miss of that orbital strike. To narrowly escape your mortality gives quick spice to the libido, and this would be such an easy way to extinguish those inconvenient embers I carry for Recadat. “You’re a proxy.”

“That does not mean I lack. Quite the opposite. In me you’ll find all that you need, my duelist.” She leans a little closer. “I’ve been so patient. Should I not be rewarded a little? Should you not indulge yourself so your humors will be soothed, your hungers sated? Then you’ll be ready for the rest. The Divide is a taxing campaign.”

“And duelist and regalia should be wedded in intent and action, so I have heard.” A split second’s decision that I may later regret. For the moment I can only think of how soft her skin looks, how voluptuous she is, the banquet offered by her breasts. Those indentations of clavicles framing the fire opal. I take off one glove and cup her face, running my thumb along jawline and then earlobe. Utterly authentic. I’d never know I am with a machine.

Daji grins, her teeth showing sharp and fine and ravenous. She unbuckles my belt then replaces it with the harness that secures the prosthesis to me. I activate the module associated with it, the sensory array that joins my nervous system to the device: a thick length of supple material, done in oxblood. Once it is affixed and online, it rests between my legs, soft.

Her fingers graze slowly along the shaft, stroking, teasing. It stiffens. “Sensitive,” she says. “This responds to your arousal, doesn’t it? Most appliances of this category are more . . . static.”

I rub my thumb against her lips. Feels, briefly, the tips of her incisors. Little needlepoints. “This stays hard as long as I have the will.”

“A lovely function.” Her hand