The Future, Imperfect: Short Stories

by Ruth Nestvold

  She realized she didn't want to remember what had happened afterwards — and after she had hopefully turned off her feed. She might be a two-bit sim starlet, but she had never been the entertainment at some sort of stag party for the upper echelons before. And whatever had happened to her, it was probably better for her peace of mind if she didn't know.

  What you couldn't remember couldn't hurt you.

  Okay, that might not be strictly true, but at this particular unpleasant moment in time, it seemed to sum up her situation. Then somewhere a child whimpered. What the hell could that be?

  Mercedes sat up in the bed and put a hand to her head. Her wrists felt bruised.

  There it was, that whimper again. She slung her long legs out of the bed and reached for the evening dress draped over the chair nearby. After pulling the tight lamé jersey over her head, he got up carefully, focusing on the simplest objects around her. Whatever she'd had at that party, she swore she'd never indulge in it again.

  Or perhaps it was something she'd been forced to have?

  The door to the living room of the suite was open a crack, and Mercedes peered through. A little girl, perhaps nine or ten years old, was being pulled into the room where Senator Skalin sat on the couch between two men Mercedes didn't know. The girl was gagged and her eyes bound. The whimpers Mercedes had heard were probably the only sounds she could make.

  A burning nausea that had nothing to do with the abuses of the night before rose in her throat. Mercedes stood frozen, trying to figure out what to do. There were four men out there and only one of her.

  Then a tall man with a mustache spoke up. "Shouldn't we deal with the overgrown one first?"

  The overgrown one. That would have to be her. She didn't think they meant to escort her out.

  Mercedes looked around quickly. To her left was the door to the bathroom. With any luck it would also have an exit into the hall leading to the front door of the suite.

  If she wanted to get out of this alive, it might also be good to have a weapon. But what? The lamp. Quietly, she pulled the plug, picked up the lamp, and crept into the bathroom. Sure enough, there was another door next to the one she had come through.

  Now, fast.

  She slammed open the door and brained the man who held the little girl. He fell to the carpet with a soft grunt. Before the other three could react, she threw the lamp at them.

  Mercedes grabbed the girl's hand. "Come on!"

  She ran out into the hall, dragging the girl behind. "Help!" she screamed. "We're being followed!"

  The hallway remained empty.

  Perhaps it would be better if her feed were still active after all. She tried to access the neurobroadcaster while pulling the blindfold off the girl's head. Nothing — it seemed to be jammed, and she didn't have the time to figure out how to get it working again.

  There, a stairwell. Maybe they could find someone to help them on another floor.

  As they ran down the stairs, the door above them slammed open and gunfire sprayed down on the walls and the railing. The girl made a high-pitched noise that would have been a scream if she hadn't been gagged.

  Mercedes pushed open the door of the next floor, shouting for help, but here too the hotel appeared deserted.

  What was she going to do?

  She turned the corner to the right, dragging the girl with her, hoping the corporation minions would go a different way. There, at the end of the hall, a window. It was their only hope.

  She slid the window open on black, black night. It looked like they were on the second floor, and below was a patch of lawn. They would have to risk it.

  "We're going to have to jump," Mercedes explained to the little girl, but she hung back, shaking her head, whimpering.

  One of their pursuers hurtled around the corner, running towards them, gun aimed at Mercedes. The first shot shattered the glass behind her.

  "Come on, come on, come on!" She yanked the girl's hand, but the child held back, pulling away with more strength than Mercedes would have thought possible.

  Another shot, just past her head. Mercedes panicked. She had to get away. She released the girl's hand and clambered over the ledge. The gown bunched around her hips, she jumped.

  And landed, falling from the impact and rolling down a slight incline. Above her, shots rang out, spraying into the grass around her. She ran for the cover of the trees, bruises on more than just her wrists now, but glad that nothing was broken.

  Oh, why hadn't the girl jumped with her?

  Mercedes pushed back a sob. She briefly considered going to the zone security offices, but as soon as the thought occurred to her, she discarded it: Rasmussen was one of the most powerful men in the Seattle Corporate Zone, and security was full of his men. The little party she'd just fled had been important enough to empty out at least two floors of a hotel. She wouldn't be surprised if there was a search warrant out on her soon.

  Three blocks from the hotel, Mercedes flagged down a taxi. It was early fall and the night air was cold, especially in bare feet and wearing nothing but an evening gown. But that was not the worst of her problems. She could only hope zone security had not yet cut off her account, made her a non-person.

  The little girl.

  Mercedes pushed back the thought, giving the driver her thumb as they reached her apartment. The payment went through.

  Her identity wouldn't be hers for much longer, though. She had to work fast. As soon as the door shut behind her, she found a pair of scissors, hacked off her long, artificially black hair, and hid the rest under a dark scarf. Then she pulled on slacks and a sweatshirt, threw as many clothes and valuables as she could in an overnight bag, and headed for the parking garage and her car.

  She was on the outskirts of downtown and making her way to I5 north when the implant in her brain came alive again. Return to the hotel. The little girl.

  Mercedes slammed on the brakes and pulled the car over. Rasmussen or Skalin or someone was messing with her brain. What if they made her believe she was turning right while she was really turning left? Could she end up in their hands even as she thought she was running away?

  No, she wouldn't let them. Two could play at that game. She might not have gotten far yet as a sim star, but the quality of her emotions and impressions had been praised more than once by those who subscribed to her feed. And much of what she broadcast was simulated.

  She would placate her pursuers with imagined experience while she used the time gained to get away. She couldn't keep such an illusion up forever, but perhaps she could distract them long enough to get across the border to Canada, where zone security had no power — or at least less. She could do this.

  Mercedes leaned back in the seat of her car and formed a mental image of restarting and driving the vehicle in the direction of the hotel, sending the image to the private feed of her neurobroadcaster. Once she was sure the illusion she wanted was established, she got out of her car and began to walk down the hill towards the waterfront and the train station on South Jackson Street.

  But first she would have to make a short detour to the local identity experts.

  * * * *

  Vancouver, BC, October 2

  When Mercedes entered the used bookstore where she worked part-time, the old-fashioned bell tinkled above her.

  Bonnie, the bookstore owner, looked up from her paper newspaper with a friendly smile. Mercedes's boss was a good-natured woman with curly blondish-brown hair and a generous figure who looked like she was never in a bad mood. An underground refugee group had helped Mercedes create a new identity and find this job. Every time Mercedes saw Bonnie's merry face, she was more grateful than she could ever safely express — given what she had escaped and left behind.

  The little girl.

  "How'd it go?" Bonnie asked.

  Mercedes shrugged. "Lots of folks trying out, even though it's just a flat and not a holo. I'll have to wait and see if they want me for call-backs."

  "Good luck, Mary."

&
nbsp; Her alias still gave her pause, although she was used to roles — and even feigning her own experience. "Thanks."

  Mercedes stepped behind the counter, slipping out of the fitted wool jacket she'd bought at a local thrift shop. Bonnie turned a page of the newspaper. A color photo in the top left-hand corner caught Mercedes's eye.

  A reminder of the nightmares.

  "You want a section?" Bonnie asked.

  She wished she could snatch the paper out of her boss's hands, but she played nonchalant. "I prefer a screen and some action rather than just words," Mercedes said, bringing up the monitor on the right end of the tabletop. "Not as boring."

  Bonnie chuckled. "You are a strange one to take a job in a bookstore."

  "And you are a strange one to have me," Mercedes replied, making an effort to grin.

  "Touché." Her boss folded up the newspaper and laid it aside. "But old fashioned print media is not as censored. Most people have the same attitude as you — which means paper isn't important enough to bother with to those who only want certain stories to appear. And that means it has more information than all the filtered images you get."

  Mercedes shrugged. "News never interested me much. It's all bad anyway."

  Bonnie gestured to the coverage of the latest star search program on the screen, laughing out loud. "And what do you call that?"

  The singing was off key in a very painful way, and to her surprise, Mercedes found herself chuckling. Since she'd fled Seattle, it had been very hard to laugh. "Ok, I think the point count is even for now."

  Bonnie grinned, arming a load of books that had come into the store in the course of the previous day. "I need to shelve these." She fished two paperbacks out of the pile and dropped them on the counter in front of Mercedes. "Here are a couple you might like. When the singing gets too painful, give them a shot — you might even find that books can be entertaining."

  Just to humor her friendly boss, (who had just made her laugh!) Mercedes picked them up and read the titles. Fahrenheit 451 and The Scarlet Pimpernel.

  But when Bonnie disappeared among the stacks at the back of the store, it wasn't the books Mercedes grabbed, it was the old-fashioned newspaper. She unfolded it and leafed through the oversized pages. There it was, the picture that had caught Mercedes's eye.

  The little girl.

  Mercedes scanned the article. Amy Havel, nine years old, missing over two weeks. Keith Rasmussen, on the board of Hypersystems zone security, was quoted as saying that he would do everything in his power to find the child and what a tragedy her disappearance was. Rasmussen — one of the hosts of the party.

  Her ears went hot. Feeling dizzy, she had to put down the paper.

  She is tied up, gagged, eyes bound. Everything hurts. At least she can't smell the awful cologne, so the fat man probably isn't in the room. She can't smell anything except the upholstery of the musty sofa beneath her cheek. She thinks she is alone.

  Mercifully, blessedly alone.

  She wants to go home, but she doesn't think that will happen anymore. Her greatest wish now is that it will end, that she will never smell that cologne again.

  Mercedes gripped her head. Was she imagining it? Or was it somehow private feed to her neurobroadcaster? But how would that be possible?

  No, she had to be imagining it. On the other hand, Mercedes didn't know much about the technology she had once used almost daily — it was no more than everyday magic that she had bought on credit and paid off with many long hours of broadcasts and a loyal core of subscriber fees.

  What were those subscribers doing now, with her public broadcasts cut off? Climbing the barricades and sending her nasty mails? Or were they more concerned than pissed off, wondering why her feed had stopped? Maybe now that she was safely away, she could attempt a short broadcast, putting herself somewhere completely different than Vancouver, try to explain to the people who shared her life, both the real and the fake. She certainly wanted to. Living her life publicly not only paid the bills, it had become her life.

  She accessed her neurobroadcaster, as she did nervously at least ten times a day. There was the little icon of the red hand; the block was still in effect, no activity. The impressions from the little girl couldn't be real. Yes, her mind had been temporarily infiltrated back in Seattle, but she'd been running for her life, and she must have grown careless. Now she was sitting in a bookstore, no threat near or far.

  She stared down at the newsprint on the counter and the face of the little girl — whom she had not saved.

  The bell tinkled as one of their rare customer entered the shop. Mercedes heaved a sigh of relief at the distraction from her demons. "May I help you?"

  * * * *

  Mercedes is wandering along a volcanic beach that is nearly black, the sand coarse and not at all romantic. To her right, barren desert hills loom, and to her left, the Atlantic is an intense blue that seems unreal. The rough-grained sand rubs against her bare feet, digs into the spaces between her toes.

  It is a memory of a long-ago vacation on Fuerteventura which she has tried to make real. She does not yet know how best to send a message to those who participated in her broadcast life, but she decides to take a virtual rest under the Spanish sun and lies down in the sand.

  Three men approach her, and somehow she cannot regain control of the simulated experience she started.

  Rasmussen stands above her, tall and gray, his thugs beside him. "You think you have escaped us, Mercedes? You haven't. You belong to us, you know."

  How did he get into her fake projected broadcast?

  "No. You won't catch me. No, no, no."

  "Catch you? We have no need to catch you. But it is time to end this."

  * * * *

  Bonnie dumped a couple of books into the free box near the door, scaring Mercedes out of her broadcast turned nightmare. "You seem a bit pale, Mary. Everything all right?"

  Mercedes nodded, reestablishing the blocks in her neurobroadcaster. How had Rasmussen gotten into her feed? If he could find her so quickly, she couldn't risk broadcasting again.

  "Maybe still just nerves from the tryouts yesterday," she said. Outside, the sky was almost dark — the days were getting shorter.

  "Hey, why don't we close a little early and go for a coffee? You up for that?"

  "That sounds good." Maybe some caffeine would help chase the boogie man away.

  Her boss smiled. "Why don't you go to the back room, relax. I can lock up, and then I'll join you."

  "Thanks, I think I'll do that." Mercedes rose and took her jacket off the hook.

  "Wait, take this." Bonnie stuffed the newspaper into her shoulder bag as Mercedes was coming out from behind the counter. "You should get in the habit of reading paper media more."

  Mercedes attempted a chuckle. "If you say so, boss."

  They exited the bookstore out the back alley entrance. Bonnie shoved her hands in the generous pockets of her coat. "So tell me, what made you leave Edmonton and come to Vancouver?"

  Mercedes shrugged, playing the role that went with her new identity. "Hey, have you ever been to Edmonton?"

  Bonnie laughed.

  "As you can imagine, the opportunities there aren't much for someone who wants to act. And you? What brought you to Vancouver?"

  "Love," Bonnie said shortly. "It's over now."

  "I'm sorry."

  Bonnie pushed open the door of a small, funky café. It didn't have the polished wood flair of Starbucks, but the smells that assaulted Mercy's nostrils were heavenly. She glanced up at the menu behind the counter — and the prices were actually affordable.

  "No need to be sorry," Bonnie said as they got in line. "I love this city. And my life is full enough to keep me distracted."

  Full? As owner of a store dealing in archaic media?

  On the other hand, excitement was highly over-rated.

  They ordered and sat down at a rickety table. Since they were doing the girl-thing, Mercedes went ahead and asked. "So what happened?"

&n
bsp; Bonnie blew on her coffee and took a sip. "He changed. I guess I changed too. It doesn't matter now."

  Mercedes looked at her boss, at the intense expression she had never seen before on the usually merry face. "But you still love him."

  The other woman shook her head. "No. He's dead."

  "Shit." This conversation was getting a bit too heavy for an evening wind-down session.

  "That about covers it." Bonnie shook her head, as if to clear things out, and smiled again. "I didn't mean for a coffee after work to turn into this. Shall we start over?"

  Mercedes didn't mind at all. While they finished their coffees, they babbled about the kinds of bands and series and holos they enjoyed, and Bonnie's infectious laugh rang out in the small café. Mercedes felt as if she were watching the proceedings from above — playing a game with her boss, not going beneath the surface, like a negotiated truce.

  But then the coffee cups were empty and neither one of them seemed to have the need to continue the skewed intimacy of their evening.

  They rose. "See you tomorrow," Mercedes said.

  Bonnie smiled. "Yeah. Sleep well, okay?"

  "I'll try."

  Outside, the air had begun to take on the crispness of a fall night, and the sky was remarkably clear for the Puget Sound. The stars rose above her, a speckled curtain for a stage she couldn't enter. Beyond the lights of the city, on the opposite side of Vancouver Harbour, mountains loomed like the glowering walls of a medieval castle. Green by day, by night they were a bluish black, deep and dark, trapping Vancouver in the area between water and wall, forcing it to walk the water and climb the wall to still the city's thirst for growth. A jumble of building blocks between dark and dark, sprinkled with light, alive in the reflection on the water, distorted by a breeze making the points of light dance like a mythical troop of fairies.

  She could have done a brilliant broadcast of this.

  Mercedes pulled the fitted jacket tighter around her waist. Once, she had been a girl who believed in fairies and the pennies she found on the street. But that had been before she had come up against the corporations.