by Joni Bing
****
“Looks like not much has changed.”
I walked into the room first with my hands in my jacket pockets and looked around the barely lit room, while waiting for Robyn to appear somewhere deep inside.
“Rooms don't tend to change,” Josh walked up to the database control and the home screen looked just as it had before. “But technology's always renewing.”
I watched him maneuver around the system and spoke up when he logged in.
“Um, before you...do all that. Can you search for someone?”
“Name?”
“Robyn.”
“Robyn Grant?”
“Please? You know her?”
Josh typed in her name then looked over at me. “Bleu, I used to live here.”
“Oh...right.”
We weren't playing a game, but in my head I still dropped as if I had lost points. Josh hit the Fetch Documentation button that acted as the search button for the database and the shock of the news subconsciously made me take a few steps back.
“She's dead,” Josh announced without shock present in his tone.
“She can't be she...she was just here yesterday.”
I bit down on what was left of my thumbnail and pressed my other nails into my palm to distract myself from the pain of the news.
“The database doesn't lie, Bleu. She's gone.”
I walked up to the wide screen still mentally rejecting the news. “That's impossible! That has to be wrong! What about her kids?!”
“They'll be enrolled into the System. They're Gov property.”
“So, that's it? They get no say anymore? No freedom to do what they want?”
“You know how things work now, Bleu.”
His voice wasn't stern, but it was knowledgable and held a hint of sympathy. He could relate; only the real Josh could. I hadn't known Josh for very long when NR came to get his father who was drowning in debt. Back then, the rules were and still are that when someone of the middle or lower class hits a certain balance of debt owed to the Gov, they can be taken and forcibly enrolled into a work force run by the System. Depending on the debt owed, that “Recovery”, as the Gov calls it, could take months to years to even a lifetime.
Unfortunately, Josh's father wasn't so lucky and it took him years to Recover, forcing Josh to take over as man of the house until his own capturing. Thankfully, my mother never landed in that situation, but it pained me to think about how she may have avoided it being a middle class single mother with a child. Now that I knew the truth, all I could think about was how Josh's mother must've been surviving with both of her means of a second income gone.
I watched Josh exterminate one last 990 member—Reno—and he turned with a estranged yet familiar smile.
“Okay, all dead.”
I chuckled a little to fill the awk moment. “Probably the first and last time that'll ever be good news to hear.”
“Not exactly. There's always the day Dickens somehow gets what he deserves.”
“Captain!” I gasped playfully. Josh laughed and I shook my head. “Yeah, that'll be the day.”
Josh didn't respond as he shut down the database before we exited the room, and I wondered if he and Lary had discussed that possibility. Just the thought of being a part of such a plan made me shiver. There would be a bloodbath in our pursuit of Dicken's head, I was sure, but if the plan failed it wouldn't be a good one.
“So, what's next?” Josh asked as we arrived on the first floor.
We walked quick out of the hall and into the night. I took time to answer his question mainly because I couldn't think of what to ask him that would pull out any inside information. He was patient with me and didn't persist in asking me, which wasn't unlike his character. Things were starting to match up, which also delayed my response. There were so many options that should and could happen next.
The options were all for self or for the Skins. For my past desires or for the future freedom of the nation. Me versus the fate of the world. Then suddenly, I knew just what to do. Something that would suffice the needs of both a lady and her nation.
“Let's go grab a drink at Murry's.”