Read Weir Codex 1: The Cestus Concern for Free Online Page B

being thrown into the side of a building. His relief, however, was short lived as the lip his claws held onto disintegrated under his weight, sending him falling once more toward the pavement hundreds of feet below.
    This time, Mal was close enough to jam both arms into the pale gray skin of the building to slow his fall. Ten gouges ripped through stone and steel and glass as Mal’s descent continued, destroying the once pristine face of the skyscraper.
    Mal kept his head down to keep his face safe from deadly debris as he fell and forced back the pain of having his shoulders nearly ripped off in the process of saving himself. Silently, Mal thanked whoever made his new arms even as he cursed them for what they had done to him.
    Twenty feet above the ground, the regular construction of the building halted for the vaulted ceilings of the first floor and Mal found himself in a short free fall once more.
    Mal landed harshly, skidding to a halt just outside of the giant glass entrance of the building. The rough stone of the pavement shredded the skin on his left leg and re-aggravated the semi-healed bullet wound in his thigh as he vaulted to one side to dodge the dagger sharp shards of glass and brick the blades of his fingers had torn free during his escape.
    A businessman in a four thousand dollar charcoal-colored H. Huntsman Super 100 wool suit and fifteen hundred dollar John Lobb shoes, shocked by the sight of an incredibly muscled, naked man with metal arms dropping out of the sky, barely noticed the four foot tall brass and aluminum “3” crashing into the ground mere inches from his body as he about-faced and hurried back inside through the nearest set of revolving doors.
    Mal inhaled deeply and let it out slowly to try and calm the jack-hammering of his heart. Easing slowly to his feet, the battered, bruised and bloodied man took inventory of his wounds: three broken or cracked ribs, broken nose, a bullet hole in his upper thigh, skin scraped almost entirely off of his left side, glass embedded in places he didn’t want to think about and a bruised tail-bone from dropping onto his butt after a nine hundred and sixty plus foot fall.
    Oh, that and he seemed to be missing two arms, his pectoral muscles, most of his back and all of his clothing.
    All things considered, he was lucky to be alive at all.
    Bare feet slapped pavement warmed by the hot summer sun of Southern California. Mal headed for the large, briskly moving street out in front of the tower. He was completely unsure of where to go or even how to get there in the middle of downtown Los Angeles without any clothing. Before he discovered an answer to either of those questions, a third problem arose when a shrill alarm sounded from somewhere in the depths of the US Bank Tower.
    Damn it, thought Mal to himself as he continued towards the street in hopes of a solution to his dilemma would fall out of the sky the same way he had. He figured it would take them—whoever ‘them’ was—a few minutes to get any sort of response team together and down to street level.
    At least no one has noticed me, was Mal’s thought as he looked around and noticed a crowd gathering on the street nearby.
    “Surveillance devices detected,” announced the computer voice from within. “Executing countermeasures.”
    Frustration consumed Mal as he bolted towards a mixed trio of a large, balding man with sweat stains on the armpits of his long-sleeved blue dress shirt, an elderly Korean woman with a small push cart full of grocery bags, and a tall man dressed in denim jeans and a stark white wife-beater, half astride a still-idling black-and-green Kawasaki Z1000 motorcycle. A black, full-face helmet and leather jacket sat on the seat in front of the man.
    They were all staring at him through the cameras in their cell phones.
    “That’s just superb,” spat Mal as he neared the group and gave them some excellent footage of ‘Little Mal’ flapping in the breeze. “I hope those