The Best Science Fiction of the Year

by Neil Clarke

  “She doesn’t like the costume,” Rina muttered. “I didn’t like it either.”

  Kaori raised an inquisitive eyebrow. “No one likes the costumes. They’re always terrible, this time especially. But we wear them anyway, and they’re never as bad as they look at first.” She headed for the dresser and began digging through drawers. Stockings, lingerie, and compression tights fluttered to the carpet. “What they need to do, in my opinion, is kiss and make up. Or make out. Whichever one helps the most.”

  Ruriko’s head jerked up. “You think they’re together?”

  Kaori laughed. “Everyone knows. They’re so obvious. Even Miyu knows, and she’s in denial because she’s half in love with Yume herself.”

  Ruriko’s stomach turned and she sat down, hard, right there on the floor. They’d fought because Ruriko had wanted to tell the rest of IRIS about them and Yume hadn’t. The media would have eviscerated them. Ruriko hadn’t cared.

  The last thing she’d heard, before she’d turned on her heel and stormed away, was Yume shouting, How could you be so selfish?

  Yume had forbidden her to tell anyone anything. So Rina hadn’t. Rina stopped talking to her groupmates altogether, and the frosty silence had carried over on the train to Harajuku, days later.

  Kaori gave up on the dresser and threw open the door to her walk-in closet. The racks were a riot of color, stretching back like a long, awful throat made of bold metallic dresses and gauzy floral prints. Every costume she’d worn onstage, arranged by year instead of color. A fan’s paradise. “It’s gotta be in here. Hang on.”

  “Please don’t,” said Ruriko. Her voice came out strangled. The closet stank of bad memories; just looking at the costumes made sweat gather in her palms, at the small of her back, her heartbeat galloping into her throat. But Kaori was already rifling through them, humming one of their songs under her breath. Ruriko could only remember half of the notes; the melody in her head was distorted, like trying to listen to music underwater.

  Kaori emerged, flourishing a silver dress with a stiff, flared skirt. “Look, I found it! Isn’t this terrible?”

  “It’s really bad,” mumbled Ruriko. The second-to-last time she’d seen that costume, she’d thrown it in Yume’s face.

  Kaori pressed it against Ruriko’s chest. “Here, try it on. It is so uncomfortable, you will not believe it.”

  Ruriko should have said no. But all she could think of was how she had screamed at Yume, sending the dress flying in her face like a giant bat. If she could have taken it back—if she could take any of it back—

  Something must have been wrong with her head, because then she was stepping out of her jeans, and Kaori was zipping the dress up behind her, all the way to the nape of her neck. It didn’t fit properly; their bodies weren’t the same shape, and where Ruriko was small and soft, Kaori was tall and toned. This version of her, seventeen years old and programmed with a new set of memories—October twelfth, two days from IRIS’s amputated future—was full of tomboyish energy and excitement.

  “See, I told you. But you actually look pretty good in this,” said Kaori, turning her toward the mirror. They stood side by side, Ruriko pinched into a dress that was too tight in the waist and too loose in the bust, Kaori comfortable in shorts and a light blouse. The dress gaped open like a loose flap of skin over Ruriko’s breasts. None of it fit, and it was hard to even look at her own body.

  And then Kaori tapped a panel on the wall, and music blared into the tiny room. Synth vocals over a pulsing beat, four voices in one.

  The Aidoru Hotel vanished. Ruriko was back there, standing on that slowly rising stage, her eyes wide in the dark, the ceiling of the Astro Hall soaring high above her in perfect geometry, her high heels already pinching her feet with two and a half hours left to dance, empty palm aching to hold Yume’s hand, mouth still angry, both at Yume and at herself for not being able to get over it, waiting beneath that teetering lighting grid, waiting for the tech cue to start the third song, waiting—

  “I can’t do this.” Ruriko’s hands scratched wildly at the dress, hunting for the zipper. She couldn’t reach it, and she thought, wildly, What if I am stuck in this forever? “I can’t, I can’t—”

  The music cut off and her ears rang with silence. Hands found her and unzipped her quickly, and Ruriko sagged with relief. “Are you okay?” asked Kaori. Looking at her, Ruriko saw, instead of her wide, earnest face, a mess of dark hair spilling out from beneath two tons of metal, and sharp, shocked shapes of blood splattered across the stage.

  “I don’t think so,” Ruriko whispered. She couldn’t be okay, not if she was paying to destroy herself, over and over every month.

  Kaori pulled her into her arms and held her tight. They stayed like that until Ruriko’s two hours were up.

  Ruriko was still shaking as she boarded her train home. Her phone rattled in her grip. But by the time the subway reached its next stop, she had booked and paid for her next appointment at the Aidoru.

  “This is going to sound rich, coming from me,” said Shunsuke, “but you need to learn to let things go.”

  They stood on the balcony of Shunsuke’s apartment, smoking together and watching the rain pour down in great sheets. The brilliant multicolored lights from all the signs and ads and cars zinging by became patchy and blurred, doubled and strange, in this weather.

  “Sure I do. Speaking of, how’s that new dry cleaner working out for you?” said Ruriko.

  “He’s great. He never asks any questions.” He cut his eyes at her. “I’m serious. Those girls can’t remember anything. They don’t even know who you are.”

  “They can’t remember,” Ruriko mumbled, stabbing out her cigarette. “But I can’t forget. I don’t want to forget.”

  “You know what always helps me,” said Shun, and Ruriko hated him for what he was about to say. “Cutting right to the heart of the problem. And you’re the heart, Rina-ko. Not them.”

  She flicked the cigarette off the edge of the balcony. Its dying ember flickered in the air, fluttering downward before disappearing into the night.

  “You can finish this. You’ll never have to go back again.”

  She whirled on him, anger flaring bright in her. Shunsuke always acted like he had everything figured out, with his sly voice and dry cleaning and neat little suitcase. “Does it feel good to lie to me?” she snapped. “Is that why you keep coming back to Aidoru, Shun? Because you’ve excised the heart of the problem?”

  He stared hard at her and turned away. Ruriko bit her lip to keep any more of the venom bubbling up in her mouth from spilling out.

  Looking at the tall, lanky shape he cut against the sky, she realized how different he was from when she’d seen him the first time, over ten years ago, surrounded by the other members of his group. He’d been small back then, with bleached blond hair, and in the decade following his own accident, he’d grown into himself and left his gangliness behind. He was sharper now, harder. And there was only ever one room that Shunsuke visited at the Aidoru, only ever one person.

  “Do you ever talk to him?” she said at last. “When you go to see him?”

  Shunsuke passed her another cigarette. There was still synthetic blood on his sleeve, a dark, thin stain running toward his wrist. “What would we have to talk about?” he said.

  Cutting right to the heart of the problem, Shunsuke had said. As if it were that easy. But he’d opened his suitcase and pressed a bright switchblade into her hand before she left, folding her fingers over its polished wooden handle. Trust me. It’ll feel better afterward.

  People came to the Aidoru Hotel for answers. Therapy, excess, an outlet for stress. To sate obsessions. If the Aidoru could help someone as fucked up as Shunsuke, Ruriko reasoned, then surely it could help someone like her.

  The overwhelming roar of pop music threatened to crush her down into the plush, ugly black-and-white hallway carpet. Upstairs and downstairs, people were already fucking TV personalities and musicians long dead, and somewhere el
se in the hotel, Shunsuke was about to take his bright knife to his younger self’s skin. But Ruriko stood alone outside a room she’d paid for, Shunsuke’s borrowed switchblade in her pocket, too afraid to touch the door.

  You already spent your money, said a voice in her head. It sounded like hers, but off, the way recordings of her own voice always sounded. A room here is expensive. Don’t waste it.

  It’ll make you feel better, said Shunsuke’s voice. Trust me.

  The only person you think about is yourself, whispered Yume. Fix that, and then we’ll talk.

  No one in their right mind came to the Aidoru Hotel, thought Ruriko, and she gripped her key card tight and reached for the lock.

  The door slid open on its own, and Ruriko’s hand leaped back. A dark-haired girl peered at her from inside the room, one hand up to shield her eyes from the bright cacophony of pop music. She was the same height, the same build as Ruriko, if ten years slimmer and younger.

  “Are you going to come in?” said Rina Tanaka. “Or are you going to stand in the hall all night?”

  After a moment, Ruriko tucked her key card back in her jacket pocket and followed her inside. Rina’s room was all dusty violet, the color of her childhood room. The lights were dim, and Rina slid the switches up, making the room brighter. The wallpaper glinted with silver interlocked triangles, and they winked viciously at her as she passed.

  “I was wondering when you’d stop by. I’ve been waiting for you.”

  Ruriko studied her, hiding her nervousness behind her mask. Rina looked about seventeen and had the same angled haircut that Ruriko remembered getting in September, right before the show in Shibuya with the powder-blue uniforms. “How did you know I was coming?”

  “Your friend told me. He’s been visiting me for a while. Paid for memory retention services and everything.” This was Rina minus her stage persona, rougher than the other girls in IRIS, always a little too honest. In her voice, Ruriko heard the hints of Kabukicho that she’d spent her life trying to erase. “He said a woman with a red face mask would come by because she wanted to talk to me about something, but he didn’t tell me what it was. And you’re the only woman with a red face mask I’ve seen so far.”

  Shunsuke had set this up for her. Ruriko’s hands shook; she kept them tucked in her pockets. The knife burned in her pocket. He’d probably meant it as a gift.

  “Hey, you’re from Kabukicho too, aren’t you?” said Rina. She smiled. Ruriko had had that smile once too. “So who are you? What did you want to tell me?”

  “You’re going to let her die,” said Ruriko, the words tumbling out past her clenched teeth. “At the Astro Hall.” She had Rina’s full attention now. And in that face, Ruriko read what she’d known was there—the anger, the fear, that she remembered having before they set out for Harajuku. “The lighting grid is faulty, it fell, and it crushed everyone. Yume—”

  “Stop it,” Rina said tightly. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” But her eyes were overbright, her voice too high.

  Ruriko grabbed her by the shoulders. “She died. You killed her, because you were a selfish little shit, you showed up late because you were sulking and wanted to make them miss you, there wasn’t enough time to run a tech rehearsal, they would have caught it—’

  “I know!” Rina pushed at Ruriko, but Ruriko held on. Tears brimmed in Rina’s eyes. “Fuck! I know! I remember. Did you think I’d forget?”

  Ruriko’s grip was so tight that her fingers were starting to hurt. “What?”

  “I was an idiot. I thought—I was so mad. I was so upset at her. I thought she’d dump me for sure after that.” Rina’s tears splattered onto Ruriko’s arms. She wasn’t pushing her away anymore; she gripped Ruriko’s shirt. “I wanted to make her hate me. I wanted to make her pay.”

  She had wanted that. And Yume had paid. But Ruriko’s head was reeling, and she shook Rina. “What day is it?” she demanded. “What’s the last day you remember?”

  “October twenty-fifth,” whispered Rina. “I woke up in the hospital. The people from the talent agency were there. They said they’d scanned me while I was out. They told me I’d never dance again. Everyone else in IRIS was dead, and if I knew what was good for me, I’d pretend I was too.”

  She’d forgotten. Ruriko let go of Rina. She’d forgotten about that last scan; those days were a blur of grief, horror, regret, and it hadn’t seemed important in the wake of her loss. Yume was gone.

  “I could have saved her,” said Ruriko. She felt numb. She’d been so stupid. “She was right. How could I have been so selfish?”

  “You?” A look of terrible revelation crossed Rina’s face. “What’s under this mask? Who are you?” She reached out toward Ruriko’s mask.

  Ruriko shoved her away as hard as she could. Rina stumbled back into the small wooden vanity parked against the wall. “Don’t touch me,” Ruriko said hoarsely. All their collective secrets were spilling into open air.

  “Please,” said Rina, but Ruriko backed away. Her awful synthetic body with its awful synthetic skin and awful synthetic youth, its face twisted with regret but still whole, made Ruriko sick.

  She turned and fled the room. She was in the elevator and through the lobby and out into the street, fifteen minutes into her two-hour time slot. She didn’t ask for a refund.

  It took a long time for Ruriko to come back to the Aidoru. But when she did, there was only one door she gravitated to.

  “Does my face scare you?” said Ruriko.

  Yume glanced over at her. They lay together on the red circular bed in her room, side by side, their hands just brushing each other. One of them had accidentally hit a switch to make the bed rotate, and they hadn’t been able to figure out how to turn it off, so they turned slowly together, their feet dangling to brush the floor.

  “No, of course not. You had reconstructive surgery, right? It looks really natural.”

  The red cloth mask was wadded up in Ruriko’s other palm. How many times had this Yume seen her face? How many times had she asked her the same questions, aching to hear Yume’s affirmation, over and over again? How much did it hurt, knowing that Yume couldn’t blame her for what would happen, what did happen in Harajuku, because she would never know who Ruriko was?

  Impulsively, Ruriko sat up halfway, propping herself up on her elbows. “You know, some people have said I look like Rina Tanaka. What do you think?”

  Yume took a moment before she replied; perhaps her internal algorithm was searching for a tactful answer. “Maybe a little,” she said at last. “Your eyebrows. Very Rina Tanaka.”

  Ruriko laughed. She’d thought she’d be injured by that response, and she was surprised and pleased to find that she wasn’t. “That’s more than I thought I’d get. I’m surprised you saw any resemblance; you spend so much time together, I bet you know her better than most people.”

  “I’m seeing her later tonight,” Yume said, looking slyly at Ruriko. “We’re going to hang out after evening practice. She promised.”

  A luminous feeling spread through Ruriko’s chest. She settled her head back on her pillow and stared up at the mirrored ceiling, thinking. What had they done the night of October eighth? It hurt that she couldn’t recall all the details; they’d blurred at the edges over the years. But she remembered that it was cold already, unseasonably cold, and she had dragged Yume to the park to get ice cream anyway. Yume had been worried about getting sick in that weather. And then Ruriko had grabbed her by the scarf and kissed her to stop her scolding.

  “For ice cream?” she said.

  Yume turned to look at her, her hair falling around her like a curtain. “That’s a good idea. I was thinking about getting ice cream.” She reached out to touch Ruriko’s face, and this time Ruriko didn’t pull away. “It’s strange,” she murmured. “You do remind me a bit of her. It’s your expressions, your mannerisms, the way you talk. You’re different, but maybe you could be her cousin.”

  She grinned and leaned in to Yume’s touch. He
r fingers felt warm, real. “I guess I’m lucky.”

  “You are,” said Yume, tracing the line of Ruriko’s face, all the way down her jaw. Her touch was tender instead of sensual. “But don’t tell her I said that. I don’t want her to get a swelled head.” She shifted on the bed, and her skirt whispered around her. “You know, it’s complicated. I want her to think I’m responsible. I’m her senior, and I’m supposed to look out for her. But at the same time, I want to spoil her. There’s just something special about her; it makes me determined to show her that all her hard work is worthwhile.”

  “She loves you,” Ruriko said. She still did. “That’s why she works so hard.”

  Yume glanced at her, surprised. Ruriko expected her to deny it. But instead, gentle pink spread across her cheeks. “Is it so obvious?” she asked.

  Ruriko smiled up at her. “Only to the people who matter,” she said.

  “She has a lot of growing up to do. But she’s a good dancer. She’s full of fire. She’s . . . beautiful.”

  “Maybe you should tell her that more often.”

  “I’m only telling you this because you’re Rina’s cousin.”

  “Oh, so it’s decided now?” She swatted Yume with a pillow, and Yume yanked it away from her and tossed it across the room. “If you could,” Ruriko said, much more quietly. “If you could be with anyone, would you still want to be with her?”

  Yume hesitated and looked away. “Could we talk about something else?”

  Uncomfortable, familiar disappointment settled in Ruriko’s chest. But still, she thought, this was the closest Yume had ever come to admitting to Ruriko that she’d loved Rina. She’d said as much in private, many times. But maybe telling “Rina’s cousin” was the closest she’d come to speaking it aloud in public. “Anything you want,” she said.