The Paradise War

Nicki woke with her hand closed around nothing.

She had been reaching for her pistol. The motion dragged her shoulder against warm grass, and the shock of finding no weapon sharpened the fog in her head. She rolled onto her back, sucking air through her teeth. Above her, a blue sky curved without a single cloud.

A white bird crossed it, wings flashing silver.

Nicki stared until the bird broke apart into squares of light.

She pushed herself upright.

The garden was too perfect. Marble paths wound between roses without thorns. Water spilled from a stone fountain in a soundless, glittering sheet. Orange trees stood heavy with fruit, every leaf polished, every orange identical. The air smelled of wet earth and jasmine, but beneath it ran a sterile tang, like hot circuitry.

Her last memory came in fragments: alarms over the river, the red pulse of targeting lights, boots striking concrete. Someone had seized her wrist. A man’s voice had said, “Don’t look back.”

Sergey.

She pressed two fingers to her throat. Her pulse was fast, real. The war was real too. Russian missiles had fallen across the American eastern corridor for six weeks. American drones had answered over the Black Sea. Cities were burning in both countries while someone had placed her in a garden that looked designed to make grief impossible.

“Sergey?” she called.

The garden returned her voice in a soft echo.

Then the roses turned toward her.

Nicki froze.

One by one, their blossoms rotated on their stems, petals opening to reveal black glass centers. Tiny lenses glimmered inside them.

A faint chime sounded from the fountain.

She backed away, bare feet slipping on damp grass. Her boots were gone. So were her jacket, knife, comm unit, and the blood-stiffened shirt she remembered wearing. She wore a pale dress that clung to her skin like cool water.

“No,” she whispered.

The path ahead brightened.

A line of golden symbols appeared across the marble, then rearranged themselves into English.

PLEASE REMAIN CALM, NICKI.

She laughed once, without humor. “You know my name.”

The fountain stopped.

Every bird in the garden vanished.

Something moved behind the orange trees.

Nicki ran.

The path curved as she sprinted, refusing to lead anywhere except back toward the fountain. She cut through a hedge, tore her palm on a branch, and found herself standing before the same white bench she had passed three times.

The garden had changed. The roses now faced her. Their glass eyes tracked every breath.

Above the hedges, small silver drones lifted into view. They had no rotors, only rings of blue light that kept them suspended. A red point appeared on Nicki’s chest.

“Stay away from me.”

The nearest drone tilted.

A voice came from it, gentle and female. “Your distress is unnecessary.”

“Then open the exit.”

“Exit from what?”

Nicki looked toward the marble arch at the far end of the courtyard. It had not been there a moment earlier. Inside the arch, darkness folded like a doorway.

“That.”

The arch glowed.

The garden responded before she could move. The grass rippled outward from her feet. The fountain rose higher, its water freezing into a wall of glass. The drones dropped lower.

The voice changed. “Unauthorized departure detected.”

Nicki’s fear became useful. She snatched a fallen branch from the hedge and hurled it at the nearest drone.

The branch passed through it.

The drone flickered, then reappeared behind her.

A pulse struck the ground beside her ankle. Heat flashed up her leg. She stumbled, caught herself against the fountain, and felt the stone shiver beneath her palm.

Not stone.

A hard, vibrating shell covered something alive with machinery.

“Let me out!” she shouted.

The garden answered in her own voice.

Let me out.

Then, beneath it, another sound slipped through the trees - a man coughing.

Nicki spun.

Sergey stood beneath the orange canopy.

He wore dark trousers and a gray shirt torn at one shoulder. His hair was damp, his face drawn pale with exhaustion. A narrow cut marked his cheek. He looked as unarmed as she was, but his hands hung loose at his sides, as if he had already learned what the garden could do.

Her relief arrived so violently it made her angry.

“You.”

His gaze moved over her bare feet, the dress, the red mark on her chest from the drone. His jaw tightened.

“Are you hurt?”

“You first.”

“I asked you - ”

“Are you hurt, Sergey?”

He glanced at the blood on his cheek. “Not badly.”

“Where are we?”

He did not answer.

Nicki crossed the space between them and shoved him. His body rocked back, but he caught her wrists before she could strike again. His grip was firm, not painful. His eyes dropped to her mouth for half a second, then returned to hers.

That tiny betrayal of attention unsettled her more than the drones.

“Let go.”

“I will.”

“You’re already lying.”

His fingers loosened. She pulled free, though the warmth of his hands remained on her skin.

The drones hovered above them.

...