Arctic Rising by Tobias S. Buckell

didn’t, then the world would assume she killed him, and not even the scatter camera data was going to do her much good.
    He closed his eyes, and the whistling breathing slowed.
    There were sirens in the distance.
    Anika stood up and shielded her face with her handcuffed hands, approaching the burning remains of her home. She found the scorched, ruined, limbless body of the driver. The smell of burned flesh left her nauseous, the heat from the fire crackled and licked at her.
    But she found the keys to the SUV on the man’s belt.
    They burned her fingers, but she yanked them clear, gritting her teeth, and staggered back to the vehicle.
    The hot keys turned the car on just fine, despite the handcuffs. After a moment of leaning over to awkwardly yank the shifter into drive, she accelerated out. She saw Karl in the rearview mirror, watching her leave.
    She tensed and lowered her hands to the bottom of the wheel as she passed the emergency crews whipping their way down the road toward the base. But they paid her no mind, trying to get to the pillar of smoke as fast as they possibly could.

 
    14
    She didn’t see another batch of police until she reached the stretch of road where she fought her would-be assassin. They stood around the edge of the road near the track marks of the car she’d stolen from him.
    Lights from the ambulance rapidly strobed against the back of her eyeballs as she glanced up in the rearview mirror of the MP’s SUV.
    But no one even looked up or back at her, not bothering to wonder why there were no windows in the SUV, why her hair was being blown all over the place. She steered into what felt like a gale, a storm of her own making, but was just the unprotected blast from driving nearly fifty miles an hour. No one wondered why she was shivering and hunched over the wheel.
    Ten miles down the mountain from them, Anika slowed and pulled to a stop along the shoulder of the road.
    She took a deep breath, as if she were trying to inhale the entire vehicle out of existence, shuddering from the effort. She placed a hand against the door pillar to brace herself.
    Well, here it was, she thought. She was on the run for real now. A suspect. Innocent men had been killed.
    All because she wanted to double-check the port-of-call clearance on an old freighter.
    “Shit!” She punched the wheel with both of her handcuffed hands. Then she punched it even harder, ignoring the stabs of pain from bruises. “Shit! Shit.”
    She smacked her head against the back of the headrest. Why hadn’t she listened to Tom? Why bother with a double check if they were already cleared?
    Why not just sit up in the sky and take it easy.
    Why had she had to push it just that much further?
    She let go, then kicked the brake pedal, and the car lurched and stopped again.
    She screamed up through the open sunroof at the stars, a yawp of frustration, rage, lost choices, and fear.
    Then Anika looked around until she found the phone she’d taken from the dead man’s pocket. It had been put in an evidence bag by the shifter.
    “Vy … I’m sorry to call you so early in the morning, but I need your help,” she said in a flat voice, pulling her elbows close to her sides to try and warm herself up, but still shivering.
    *   *   *
    Vy had her come around to the back of The Greenhouse. A large Russian bouncer, Chernov, let her in through a service door and pointed at an industrial lift in the gloom, surrounded by boxes of alcohol. It was eerie to be in The Greenhouse and not hear music thumping. “Come with me,” he said. He glanced down at the cuffs, but didn’t say anything. None of his business.
    The steel floor of the lift shuddered as it rose. Gated doors passed them slowly by as they ascended through to the fifth floor.
    Chernov slid the gate aside, and they walked down a corridor. He opened the last door for her, and Anika stepped into Vy’s private office.
    Unlike The Greenhouse, Vy’s office was plant-free. Wood panels