‘How do you do that?’ she asks seriously.
‘What?’
‘That? If anyone said that it would be weird or pervy.’
‘I don’t know,’ he shrugs. ‘You do it all the time.’
‘Yeah, but I’m funny,’ she says as though this is fact. ‘I am! Cheeky fucker…get out of my hospital…what time?’
‘Lucy…’
‘I’ll come and sleep at yours tonight if you don’t tell me…’
He looks back at her, smiling with a theatrical pause.
‘Oh, my god, you flirted,’ she says, grinning like a Cheshire cat.
‘Ten to five.’
‘Fuck off.’
‘Okay, don’t then.’
‘Ten to five? For a run?’
The Day After.
‘I have questions,’ Zara says urgently as the Old Lady pours water into a glass from a jug on a garden table.
‘We all have questions, my dear,’ the Old Lady says. ‘For a start…how did Robert know we had three new recruits? How did they know where they would be? Who leaked? Hmmm? Anyone got any answers? I have. Or rather, Lars has. Seeing as he has been looking into this sorry mess all day with deputy Prisha.’
All eyes on the sheriff and his deputy. Both of whom remain impassive, waiting for instruction.
‘For your information,’ the Old Lady says, looking at Zara and Thomas. ‘Lars and Prisha are skilled investigators…they are not just law-enforcement. What other roles do you have, Lars?’
‘Compliance. Vetting. Dip-testing…amongst others.’
‘Our Sheriff is a man of few words. Prisha?’
‘Every completed RLI comes to us for compliance checking. We dip-test to make sure they’ve been done properly, and we conduct ongoing integrity testing and vetting of everyone in Discovery, especially those connected or directly involved in RLI’s.’
‘Keep going,’ the Old Lady prompts, leaning against the trestle table.
A pause as Prisha and Lars look to Bear, both seemingly evaluating the risk and threat. ‘Roshi sold out,’ Lars says bluntly, shifting the aim of his shotgun to point squarely at Bear. ‘Switched sides…’
Silence. Stunned and heavy.
‘I’m terribly sorry,’ Jacob says stiffly. ‘I do not like Roshi one bit, but she is loyal.’
‘No,’ Lars says deeply.
‘I rather think you need to watch what you say dear chap,’ Jacob says as Pete lays a gentle hand on his arm.
‘Stay calm my friend, Roshi would not do this.’
Prisha continues, ‘we found the messages from her IT account. She deleted them but we ran a recovery programme. Messages about Bear, Zara and Thomas…even down to the RLI at the Carpe Diem restaurant.’
‘She was on a mission,’ Martha says. ‘How would she have known? I sent her to 1892 earlier in the day…’
‘We’re still investigating,’ Prisha says. ‘But we do know Roshi was planning on switching sides to Freedom. She’d accessed her reset function and changed it to New York at the back of the restaurant ten seconds after being shot. The whole thing was planned.’
Bear shakes his head; it doesn’t make sense. None of it makes sense.
‘Excuse me,’ Zara asks. ‘How do you know she hasn’t reset?’
‘We are in a computer programme my dear,’ the Old Lady answers, not unkindly. ‘Simple code…we can see the reset of everyone in Discovery and Roshi has not reset.’
‘But…’ Zara says, the questions forming too fast to be spoken.
‘Roshi planned to get shot, reset there and go with them,’ Prisha says. ‘After that we wouldn’t be able to see her. True death has a unique coding. She’s dead. She probably arranged it the night before…’
‘The evidence is clear,’ the Old Lady states. ‘However. On reflection, I rather feel we have all played a part in this mess. I for one ordered Roshi into the circuit. She hated the circuit and I ordered it knowing that fact, so I have to take responsibility for her actions towards Bear, which we have all now seen, was barbaric to say the least. Torturous and degrading…but it was done and that led Bear, Thomas and Zara to Jacob and Pete and…well, on it went…we all played a part, unwittingly I grant you but nonetheless there it is…’
Bear can’t speak or think. His mind closes in with a great and terrible fear growing inside while simply not believing it.
‘None of this makes sense…’ Zara says. ‘You’re all full of shit…’
A lurch as the world around them changes to an abject blackness with each person seemingly illuminated from within. Each of them glowing within a void.
Zara’s mouth drops open, Thomas swallows, hardly able to keep up with it all while Bear just looks on, stricken to the core.
‘Shit!’ Thomas drops away as a bright golden light shoots past him leaving a glowing trail behind. It soars off into the distance, stretching as far as the eye can see. Another one flies overhead, weaving slightly with gentle undulations. A third passes, like shooting stars with solid trails. Mesmerising and stunning. Then a fourth, a fifth and more until dozens go overhead with a speed too great to track. They become hundreds. Thousands, tens of thousands and more.
One passes underneath their feet, giving the effect they are weightless. A second, a third and more and more. On it goes with bright arcing lights each with a never-ending trail stretching behind. The whole thing three dimensional with a depth they could never fathom or grasp and within seconds they are all surrounded by countless golden glowing lines that overlap and go through each other and at each point they meet a brighter dot forms.
An incredible, breath-taking thing to see and even the hardened ones, Pete and Jacob, Martha and Lucy and the two officers stare up and round in wonder.
‘Each line represents a person,’ the Old Lady’s voices carries clear. ‘Each dot represents the point of a decision, where something occurred, where something happened…’
‘It’s beautiful,’ Zara whispers.
One of the lines sags down towards them, seemingly sinking away from the others to stand out.
‘Focus now,’ the Old Lady says. The line changes to a stream of images of a life seen through the eyes of a human. From waking in the morning to brushing teeth, washing and on through a day of work in an office with a stream of motion that is over within seconds. Another one does the same, drooping down so they can see a life lived through one day in series of silent moving images. Then another and more. All from different parts of the world.
‘One day…’ the Old Lady says. ‘What you are seeing are the lives of the people on the planet Earth during one day…’ she pauses, letting each of them stare round in wonder. Even those that have seen it before gawp with their mouths open. It’s impossible not to. A thing to see. A sight to behold.
‘That is one day….and this is all of the days…’
As she speaks the lines all drift away as though going further into the distance but more join in, adding and multiplying with millions of shooting stars scorching across the blackness all at the same time to join those already there. It becomes impossible to track with billions of connecting dots as the whole of the thing grows in a scale too great to understand and through it all there is a forward motion, as though all of the lines are being carried ever onwards. It gets faster, propelling at a speed that makes them feel dizzy and jarred until suddenly, it slows down and the lines start to break away, crumbling and ending. Shrinking, getting less, getting fewer, the density receding, the populace growing smaller and still they move on but far fewer now, thousands instead of millions, hundreds instead of thousands. That it’s dying, is obvious. Dwindling away to nothing until only a few lines remain that slow and stumble until they too fade out to nothing.
‘Humanity dies. Not from one single act but from many. From climate change. From war. From minds poisoned by diatribe and evil. From ignorance, from emotional reactions…there is no one single thing to fix…’ the forward motion ends and they all gain the feeling of going backwards un
til they are back with the vast scale too great to comprehend.
‘Because there is no single thing to point at, I assess everything and seek where to tweak and change. Right now, I am working through your time periods, which is why you are here. You are all very small cogs in a very big machine…so forgive my lack of emotional outpouring for dear Roshi but as you can see, I am really rather busy…’
A blink and the world around them changes back to the hot garden of the big weathered house with the Old Lady leaning against her trestle table.
‘I declare now that no person here has responsibility for what happened. Bear will not be held accountable for his actions. He had no knowledge of who he was killing inside or outside the restaurant. He is a product of all of our stupidity, but he has skills that we will use. Zara, Thomas and Bear will commence work immediately and undergo training as they work…’
‘Am I fuck going back into that mess,’ Zara says.
‘Quite right too,’ the Old Lady says primly. ‘You’re a handler through and through, young lady. Martha will train you. That is all. Get back to work…’
‘But…’ Zara sputters.
‘Zara,’ Martha says, a quiet warning to her voice.
‘No, I want to know…where are our bodies? Who was I? What about my life before? And if humanity has ended, are we in your past? I mean when is this now and how can two AI’s both be doing the same thing? You’ll just be undermining each other and who made you? An AI has to be made right? Who set your parameters and programme?’ she trails off, staring at the Old Lady who smiles as though to a demanding child. ‘I have questions…lots of questions…’
‘We all have questions, my dear,’ the Old Lady says, walking back to her house. ‘One day, we might even get answers…’
25
THURSDAY
A beautiful autumnal dawn. Cold, crisp and clear. Bear slows from a jog to a walk. His breath pluming clouds of mist that roll up and away, disappearing forever into the sky and each step he takes leaves a darkened spot on the frozen surface of the grass.
He stops where he always stops to look down and once again feels the sadness within, a great and awful sadness.
Roses litter her grave. Roses brought back from eras and times from cities and towns, from florists and parks. Some bought, some cut, some stolen. Some grown in the tubs and planters outside his home.
He did it before. They had a thing. Only that one time but it meant something. It had meaning. He left roses before he went into the maze on the circuit and she left notes in return.
Roshi didn’t die. Not Roshi. It was a game, a trick. She told him that night to believe in her and he said he would. He held her in his arms, the woman that tortured and killed him that made him promise he would stand for her. Even when the Old Lady said she was dead it wasn’t real. She’d come back. Bear knew she would. He’d go for a piss in the night and find a blade pressed to his throat, or he would come to graveyard to find a note one morning, or a rose missing, or a sign, something only he would notice.
It never happened though, and it will never happen because Roshi is dead and it’s time to move on. It’s time to change his running route and not bring a rose to the grave every morning.
Motion behind him from feet crunching over the frozen grass. Lucy drops down at his side, placing a hand on his shoulder to steady herself into the crouch.
‘They’re beautiful,’ she says honestly. He half-expected a joke but she reaches out to pick a stem up, gently fingering the frozen petals of the red rose he brought down yesterday. ‘So many,’ she whispers, looking over the grave to the roses spilling out on the sides. She looks round, seeing the other five graves of the killed operatives centrally positioned to give honour for the sacrifice made while Roshi was put at the far side, away from view, away from everyone else. Exiled in death if not in life.
He lays the rose down, knowing it will be the last one and when he stands, he expects to feel a rush of freedom, or a great relief, something that will mark a change in his mind and outlook, but it’s the same as before. She’s not dead and he’s waiting for her to stroll out from behind a tree and say what’s up buttercup.
‘She was indestructible,’ Lucy says, rising slowly. ‘That’s part of it all. Someone so vibrant and strong, so alive…nothing could hurt Roshi. Jesus mate, I saw your circuit…I saw what you did to each other so…so, yeah…how can she die after you both did that?’
He nods. Feeling empty inside. Feeling numb.
‘She groomed you, Bear,’ Lucy says softly, reaching out to touch his hand. ‘Last time?’
‘Last time,’ he says.
She nods, studying his profile. ‘It’s the right thing.’
‘I can’t believe you turned up,’ he says, offering a smile.
‘Fuck it hurt,’ she says with a groan. ‘Getting out of bed in the dark? I was like bloody Bear stuff that I’m going back to sleep…’ he laughs at her accent that always comes back stronger when she slips into funny mode. ‘Nice though,’ she adds, looking round. ‘The dawn I mean…I can see why you do it. Peaceful…’
‘Yeah, you ready then?’
‘We walking back?’ she asks.
‘Walking? We’re not walking, Doctor Lucy.’
‘Ah, shit…’ she groans, walking after him as he turns away from Roshi for the last time. Her blue eyes sweeping over the grave, over the roses, the tip of her nose pink from the cold. A pause as her head turns to track Bear walking away, studying his form, the shape of him. ‘Cracking arse, mate…’
He turns to smile, motioning with his head. ‘Come on…we’ve warmed up now…’
From the graveyard down the lanes and avenues to the wide road into town, to Main Street that he takes at speed with Lucy at his side. They pass the big houses, the nice lawns and picket fences, one of which she owns and lives in and he reaches out for her hand, pulling her towards the junction of the steep hill.
‘Sod that,’ she says, shaking her head as he laughs. ‘Bear…no way…’
‘Yep,’ he goes behind her, his hands on the base of her spine driving her up and on while she bursts out laughing at the propulsion given. She starts running, trying to outpace him but tiring quickly from the steep ascent. He catches up, breathing easily as he once more starts pushing her up the hill. She giggles and laughs, gasping for air while trying to swear at him then blanches when his hands drop down past her backside to grip the undersides of her thighs.
‘What are you doing?’ she laughs.
‘Running for you,’ he starts pushing his arms forward, making her walk like a puppet as she bursts out laughing, trying to whack his arms away.
‘Mate…stop! I can’t…’
They reach the top, laughing and giggling then hushing each other as they pass the silent homes on the hillside, taking the rat-runs, alleys and paths to his house set away from everyone else.
‘What’s that?’ she asks, gasping for air while pointing at his pull-up bar.
‘Pull-ups.’
‘Yeah? We doing them?’
‘Do you want to?’
‘Yeah, go on then…what do I do? I can’t reach it.’
‘Jump up.’
‘I’m not a kangaroo mate…give me a boost.’
‘Okay, ready?’ he comes in close behind, his hands gripping her waist. ‘One…two…up!’
She grips the bar, hanging dead. ‘What now?’
‘Pull up,’ he says, laughing at the sight.
‘How?’ she asks.
He goes back to her, his hands on her waist again, ‘pull…that’s it…’ he lifts her up as she pulls on the bar, rising to the top then back down again. She does a few then drops and turns, grinning proudly.
‘Your turn,’ she says.
‘Nah, it’s fine.’
‘Don’t be shy,’ she says, whacking his arm. ‘I’m a doctor and I’ve seen your willy.’
‘Lucy!’
‘Go on, give me the gun show…’
‘Fuck’s sake.’
<
br /> ‘Yeah,’ she says slowly, watching him jump to start the pull-ups. ‘Jesus, how many? You’re strong as an ox…need a hand?’ she goes in close, copying what he did for her but shamelessly grabbing his backside to push him up, grunting with the effort while he bursts out laughing again.
‘Get off!’
‘Go on…do more…I gotcha mate…’ she grunts and pushes, laughing herself while his grip gives out and he drops down. ‘Enough,’ she says, wiping her eyes. ‘I’m freezing, make me a coffee?’
‘Come on,’ he leads in through his door, stepping aside to let her through then dropping his head with a sudden rush of shame at the sparseness of his home.
‘I would look away if I were you,’ she says with a smile, glancing back at him. ‘You need some colour in here…’
‘Yeah it’s…’
‘It’s fine, we’ll get there,’ she slips into doctor mode, calming, soothing, understanding. ‘Baby steps, you did the big thing letting me come with you so just change the route tomorrow, we can run somewhere else. If I’m able to walk that is…’
He smiles at the joke, getting two mugs from a cupboard. ‘You can rest, I’ve got an overnighter…’
‘Anything good?’
‘War,’ he says mildly.
‘Gee, good info there mate, thanks for the convo. Which war? Where?’
‘We in therapy again?’
‘It’s called a conversation. It’s what normal people do with their pie-holes when they’re not eating.’
He snorts, adding a teabag to his mug, ‘tea or coffee?’
‘Coffee.’
‘First World War, Ypres in Belgium…heard of it?’ he asks.
‘Yeah, course, everyone’s heard of the First World War but not the other bit.’
‘Battle of Passchendaele? I don’t think that’s changed…the other operatives have heard of it…’
‘I’m a doctor not a historian, mate, go on…what’s the job then?’
‘November 1917, Ypres in Belgium. Big fight over two days that ended with a charge from the British straight into machine gun fire…thousands killed in minutes then the Germans dropped mustard gas to hamper the medics getting to the injured.’
A Town Called Discovery Page 24