Read Blood Zero Sky for Free Online

they wouldn’t dare give me a demotion—not me, the daughter of CEO Fields.
    Thinking of my father, I take out my IC and try to call him again. Again, his voicemail greets me. Ever since Randal’s revelation I’ve been trying to get a hold of Dad, to warn him, to get his advice. I’ve left messages at his office and at his house. I’ve sent them to his IC. No response. Typical. He’s too busy for me. Well, fine—he can be blindsided by my news like everyone else.
    “Entry fee: fifty dollars. Your account has been debited,” a synthesized voice croons as I enter N-Lumin, a candle shop.
    The disembodied voice belongs to Eva, the artificially intelligent avatar who acts as my interface with the Company network and greets me from speakers hidden all over the N-Corp empire. She also lives in my IC, as my digital personal assistant. She greets me at the entrance to every Company building, and reads my mail to me, and reminds me of appointments. She’s everywhere, like a computer-based stalker following every Company employee in the world around during every minute of every day. God, how I hate her.
    “Welcome, Miss Fields,” she says, and I roll my eyes.
    No one seems to notice that I’m not May Fields at all, but perhaps her long-lost, slightly effeminate brother.
    I’m only a few steps into the store when raucous laughter echoes behind me, and I turn to the entrance of the store in time to see three squadmen amble past. Silver stars hang from large chains around their necks against their black, military-style shirts. The chrome and mother-of-pearl inlaid grips of the guns on their hips glint as they pass. Their baseball caps, each black and emblazoned with a white-embroidered “HR,” are cocked low over their eyes. These young men—each probably no older than eighteen years—walk slowly, joke loudly. A woman walking toward them changes her course, giving them plenty of space.
    One of them sees me staring and looks back at me, his eyes filled with cold mirth. I don’t want to look away, don’t want to give him the satisfaction of bowing to his alpha-dog status, but I can’t help it.
    Their strident voices fade, blend into the cacophony of bland music and inane conversation and disappear. With a hiss, I release the breath I hadn’t been aware of holding. My neck aches with tension.
    All these years, and the squads still do that to me.
    I pick up a red candle, sniff it. Coconut and cherry—or something like that. The smell reminds me of her, and I inhale again. Kali.
    I close my eyes, thinking of her, of summertime and the smell of her skin when she would come in from the sun, of the taste of her lips and the salt of her sweat and the feeling of giddy, electric fear at the thought of being caught in the divine act that was supposed to be so wrong but was really so right. Sweet Kali, long gone.
    I put the candle down, then pick it back up. I’ll buy it, burn it tonight for her, and send a prayer her way, wherever she is. Whenever I think of her, I fear the worst.
    The register is at the back of the store, and I weave my way through what must be fifty people crammed into the little shop, around table after table filled with elaborate candelabras, candles, pricks of quivering light. Before stepping up to the counter I sniff and blink my tears away.
    Then I perform the checkout ritual without a second thought. Start by stepping on the black square. There’s no tingling, no pain, no feeling whatsoever as the checkout computer scans the black cross on my face, extracting all my information: name, age, credit history, medical information, buying habits and preferences, criminal record, and Company account information. Eva’s disembodied voice says: “ Welcome, Miss Fields ,” and I set the candle on the plastic shelf in front of me, wait for the sound of the beep, then place the candle in a plastic bag and leave. As I step out of the store, Eva’s eerie, endlessly friendly voice is there, too:
    “ Thank you,