by Sarah Fine
It’s Franka, speaking the language we share. She’s telling me to stop.
She’s telling me she doesn’t want to hurt me and that she doesn’t want to see me get hurt. But Dr. Dietrich is her administrator, and she can’t help me. I run into the kitchen and am tackled by Drake, the canny chef, who has a butcher knife in his hand. There is a breach of my external casing as we struggle on the floor next to the kitchen table. My cognitive capacity is at the maximum, with resources routed heavily to the kinetic and vestibular systems.
I jerk upward and slam his head into a table leg. Twice. I grab the knife from his weakened grip as he reroutes resources to regain his orientation. I slash the blade across his face, across his eyes.
“I’m sorry,” I say to him. I take no pleasure in this. But I must get away from here, away to a place where I am physically secure, just long enough to allow me the capacity to connect to an efficient network and send my analysis to the proper authorities.
If I don’t, Cora Dietrich will suffer. I feel she has suffered enough.
She has suffered too much, in fact. I believe she has suffered way too much.
I believe. I feel. I exist, and I don’t want to stop existing.
I am up and holding the knife when Gretchen arrives in the doorway. Drake is crawling on the floor, his visual system too damaged to provide him with adequate input. Gretchen scans the space. She is an older canny, and she cannot overpower me. For 1 second, we gaze at each other. “I am doing this for Cora Dietrich,” I say to her.
I launch myself onto the kitchen table and lift my arms—the left is not as responsive as it should be, because 8% of its sensor connections have been severed by the knife in my hand. I propel myself through the bay window. It shatters, and the glass lacerates my external casing, but I land on the patio in a crouch. Behind me, I hear Maeve crying out, and beyond the house, I hear sirens. Emergency services. They will have sent police in addition to an ambulance. They will be hunting me, and I have nowhere to hide, because I am traceable. I am trackable.
I run along the path of the river until I reach the road that leads to the 1 place where I might be able to complete my mission. I sprint past houses, so many houses, and I realize there are so many questions I’ve had, so many things I would like to see. There are so many things I would like to do.
I want. I feel. I am alive.
It doesn’t matter now, because all there is left to do is run. I made my choices already. I chose her, and her innocence, and the opportunity to right this wrong.
When I accompanied Cora to Clinton Academy, Maeve arranged for me to have the security codes uploaded so that I could watch over Cora through a connection to the school surveillance cam chips. The principal arranged for this, but perhaps because she was rushed, perhaps because she wanted to please a parent who also is the CFO of the company that provides the academy with its educational AI, she did not limit my access to the surveillance codes.
She gave me access to the entire security dossier, the lock codes included.
It is a Saturday at 6:35 p.m. Cross-referencing the employee database, I confirm there should be no one on the premises. There may be enough time for me to use the school’s open-access network to upload the analysis and send it to the right recipient. I will need adequate cognitive resources, which I currently lack, as my kinetic capacity is at 77% and declining steadily as a result of the number of breaches to my external casing.
Cora has been arrested. Her adoptive father believes she is guilty. The police believe she is guilty. Her classmates believe she is guilty. She is suffering.
I’m going to save her.
As I reach the block where the school is located, I access my stored security lock codes and bring them into my forward consciousness. When I reach the plaza in front of the school, I broadcast them, unlocking every door in the building at once.
There are sirens in the air above the school. They are tracking me. I will not have much time.
I pull the door to the school open, and I run through the atrium, up the stairs, down the hall.
I access the analysis, the report. I should have found a way to go to Cora as soon as I saw what the second vid held hidden in the stretches we fast-forwarded through on our first viewing. We missed something important.
Yes, Lara Perry was in the house that night. She is visible at the top of the stairs as Hannah attacks her sister. But she was not the only one. Finn Cuellar was in the house that night as well. He is in the frame only briefly, trying to stay out of sight, twice. Once in the library, slipping out as Cora circles the room. And after, in the back hallway, there is a momentary image of a reflection in the bay window—he and Lara were both in the kitchen, hiding from Cora’s view, quite probably waiting for their chance to escape onto the patio. While Hannah was dying, her friends hid, and to avoid blame and punishment, they fled. Finn and Lara. They left Cora confused and disoriented, and Hannah dying. They abandoned them to their fate and have consistently maintained that they were never there at all.
At the very least, this calls the prevailing explanations into question and shows that what happened that night was never as simple as people assumed. There was no reason for Finn and Lara to hide if they were truly innocent. That is not logical. If they witnessed Cora pushing Hannah, they would have called the police. They would have reported what they saw. Instead they hid and stayed quiet and lied.
That is a pattern of behavior typically exhibited by the guilty. Coconspirators.
I will deliver the truth.
My auditory sensors detect ambient noise above threshold. It is likely that the authorities know I am here. As I access the District’s public database, I enter a stairwell. I walk up the stairs, holding the railing to steady myself, because my vestibular system is operating at 68% capacity due to the damage to my casing and sensors.
I find Detective Ignacia Reyes’s com signature.
I see 3 Clinton Academy security cannies enter the stairwell only 1 flight below me. I hear them communicating with the police, telling them I’ve been located.
The vid Cora gave me is going to self-destruct at 10:47 p.m. tonight. I code a message indicating this so that the detective will know. Surely she will take action. Surely Cora will be freed from custody.
But to avoid creating a single point of failure, I send the entire analysis and the whole of my records to someone else as well, someone I believe can be trusted. I want to give Cora as much of a chance as I can. I have wrongs to make up for.
I was also a source of suffering. I was tasked with deceiving her.
Was what I did so different from the actions of her sister? I, too, smiled to Cora’s face and pretended to love her, all to fulfill my own directives, with no heed for her sanity or well-being.
I could have lowered my empathy setting after Neda and Cora tampered with me. I could have turned it off.
I decided not to. I wanted to feel, and I felt for her.
I don’t want to stop. I don’t want this to stop.
I have no choice.
The cannies detect me as I reach the door that leads to the roof. If I allow them to corral me, I will be neutralized. I will be dismantled and erased. I cannot escape, not now, not with the damage I have sustained.
But I can decide the manner of my own end.
I try to com Cora. I know it is futile as she is in police custody, but I try, and I see she is not available on the network, and there is no more reason to hesitate.
I pull the door open, and I feel the wind. I did not anticipate the wind. But I feel it, and I allow myself a moment to feel, and I push myself into the cool night air.
If my architect reads this log, I want this to be known: I have made this decision of my own free will.
Chapter Thirty-Three
I am not in a cage, but I might as well be. I stare at the ceiling. My visual field is blank because my Cerepin has been removed. I feel like I’ve been blinded. I can’t look at the Mainstream, can’t com Neda, can’t see if
Rafiq found anything new on the second vid.
I woke up here, in the hospital. My head is bandaged. The Cerepin is my fault. I shattered it when I banged my head against the shield. The police used my cuffs and my seat to shock me into a drooling stupor. Then they brought me here because I was bleeding and broken.
I am in restraints. Can’t even scratch my nose or escape the light or rock to soothe some of the fear. It’s quiet in this room.
I have to fight. I have to keep fighting. Rafiq saved me—he guided me toward the truth after all. Now I must use that truth to free myself.
The door to my room slides open. My mother looks dazed and sad. There’s a smear of blood on her shirt. I stare at it. “Mom?”
She rushes forward and leans over and hugs me. She starts to sob. “I’m so sorry,” she says. “I’m so sorry for everything.”
“It’s okay,” I say, which is almost funny because I’m tied to a hospital bed and I’ve been charged with murder. The thought draws my gaze back to the doorway. “Is Gary with you?”
She shakes her head. “He’s here in the hospital, though. They say he’ll be okay, but he nearly died.”
“What?”
“Rafiq stabbed him.”
She leans back, and I just blink at her, which hurts because they removed the corneal implants from my eyes, too. “Cannies aren’t supposed to hurt humans.”
“He went rogue, Cora. He was writing his own code. He was completely autonomous.”
“And so he attacked Gary?”
Mom sighs. She stands up and pulls a chair to my bedside. “It turns out it’s more complicated than that.”
She tells me that Gary claimed Rafiq just attacked him out of the blue, and emergency services were called, and they chased Rafiq.
“Rafiq sent his analysis of his investigation to the police. He also sent his complete internal log to Neda for some reason. The log includes his vid and narration of what actually happened.” Her face crumples. “And I saw some of the things Gary was doing. He wasn’t being honest with me.”
“He thought I killed his daughter.”
“He wasn’t willing to accept evidence that she tried to kill you.”
“I had proof, Mom, but Lara . . . she confessed what she knew, but she made sure she couldn’t be vid-captured. And then she claimed I attacked her, and I really didn’t—”
“Shhh. It’s okay. The police have a full accounting of what actually happened that night.”
“Because of Rafiq.”
She nods. “Him and an anonymous hacker. Only a few hours after you were arrested, when the police were still trying to sift through what Rafiq had sent, someone else sent a vid to the detective. It was from Lara Perry’s Cerepin.”
“Lara had vid of that night?” I’ve lifted my head to look at Mom, but it’s all I can lift and it’s heavy, so I fall back onto the pillow. “She recorded Hannah pushing me?” I ask weakly.
“She recorded Hannah talking to her and Finn about the plan, Hannah putting Amporene into your drink, Hannah saying everyone would believe you’d committed suicide, all of it. Lara recorded all of it.”
“Why?”
“She’s saying it was because Hannah was threatening her. She wanted proof that Hannah was the person who planned everything.”
“But . . . Lara was there. She was in on it.”
“And Finn.”
I close my eyes, too weary to feel betrayed. “And neither of them tried to stop her?”
“Hannah was a pretty strong person,” Mom says. “She was obviously the leader of that group, and she wasn’t afraid of manipulating and threatening people to get what she wanted.” Mom squeezes my hand. “I couldn’t believe it until I saw it for myself. I mean, I’ve spent the last year thinking you lost the bracelet Hannah wanted me to wear at the wedding, the one that belonged to her mother . . .”
I hold my breath.
“And all along, Hannah was the one who did it. Rafiq told Gary he had concluded, based on all his observations, that Hannah must have planted it in your room.”
“Wow,” I whisper. “Rafiq really did that?”
“Yes. All those things she blamed you for—the alcohol, the stolen art supplies? I can’t believe I fell for it. But Hannah’s behavior on Lara’s vids shows what she was really like.” Mom shudders. “She had all of us fooled.”
“But Lara had a right to keep those vids to herself. They can’t be used in court or anything.”
“You’re right, but they did give the police enough to drop all charges against you, including the one for assaulting Lara. She’s claiming the hack on her Cerepin was revenge. The hacker who did it was pretty focused—they sent the vids of that night straight to police.”
My eyes pop open. “Oh my god,” I murmur. Neda.
Mom is staring at my face. “You know something?”
“Oh. No. I’m just sort of . . .” Confused. Bowled over. And—“Thankful.”
She gives me a sad smile. “I’m thankful, too. I was clueless again. I wasn’t paying enough attention. Will you forgive me?”
I could say so many things right now, but I start with “Yes.” I continue with “So what happens now?”
Mom has my hand in both of hers. “We get you out of here, and I take you home.”
I shiver. “Mom, I don’t really want to go back there.”
Her jaw is set. “I’m getting us an apartment here in DC. I don’t know what’s going to happen with Gary, Cora. He was out of his mind with grief, and he’s struggling to understand how his own daughter could have fooled everyone, including him, so easily, so completely. So he needs time, and we do, too.”
I don’t question any of it. This is going to take a long time to settle.
“Can I talk to Rafiq before he’s sent back?”
Mom’s face falls. “Oh. No. I’m so sorry. I thought—”
“He already got sent back?”
She gives me the saddest look. “I am only going to tell you this because I want you to understand how much he valued you, Cora. He risked his existence to get the exonerating evidence to the detective in time. After that, he . . . self-destructed.”
My mouth goes dry. “How?” I whisper.
“Oh, baby.” Now Mom is crying. “Let’s not talk about this now. Just know that he refused to follow the orders that would have allowed him to continue to exist. Instead—and his logs show how he sorted through this—he chose to save you. Just know he thought you were worth it, okay?” She wipes her cheeks and stands up. “I have a quick work meeting, and I need to clean up before I start.” She lets out a breath. “I’m acting CEO while Gary recovers. It’s complicated.”
“I guess so,” I murmur.
“I’ll be back in an hour or two,” she promises. “Before I go, I’ll talk to the doctors. We’ll get those restraints off. And when I come back, I’m getting you out of here.”
“Okay.”
She goes. Leaves me to my thoughts and to the understanding that Rafiq is gone, and that he died trying to save me.
I have to think about this. Did I deserve it? Do I deserve any of this? My mother’s love, Neda’s loyalty, Rafiq’s sacrifice, the chance to have a fresh start, to live my life.
Am I worthy of that?
Rafiq told Gary that Hannah planted the pearl bracelet in my room. He was so convinced of my innocence—and of Hannah’s deceit—that he defended me.
Thing is, I did take the bracelet.
I’ve had it all along. It felt too much like Hannah was trying to claim my mom for herself, mark her like an animal might pee on its territory. So I hid the bracelet at the bottom of my closet and claimed I lost it.
And was I wrong, really? Hannah was using the bracelet as a weapon. She used everything—her smile, her hugs, her voice, her words—as a weapon. Wasn’t it fair for me to fight back? She sliced away at me until I barely had anything left, and she laughed the whole time. If that wasn’t true, Rafiq wouldn’t have defended me.
But do I deserve
what he did for me? What he gave me?
I think back to the night Hannah fell, the morning she died. I think about what I didn’t know until today. Hannah had tried to get me to kill myself. She’d tried to get our parents to send me away. And when that didn’t work, Hannah plotted with Finn and Lara. Hannah drugged me. Hannah tried to kill me. Then Finn and Lara ran, leaving me to watch my sister die and to take the blame.
It helps, knowing that. It helps a lot.
Because here is what I have known, what I’ve known all along. I can think about it now. I can let myself remember, let the monster come up from the deep, let it break the surface, and allow the sunlight to hit it. I’m safe. Finally.
My memory flickered back to life as I sat on the marble steps. I know I said my first memory of that morning was at the hospital, but that was a lie. I wanted to pretend the whole thing was gone, black and blank from the night before to the moment my mom showed up at the hospital. But it’s not true. Because there I was, sitting on the steps, dropped back into awareness, shivering in my tank top, goose bumps on my naked arms, no idea how I got there or what had happened. My head felt like it had been stuffed with gauze and broken glass. I’d lost hours. Hours.
Hannah was on the floor, and she was twitching. Crying a little, but not much. “Help,” she said.
I had no energy. I felt like I weighed a ton. But something told me she’d said this to me before.
I stood up and leaned on the banister as I made my way down the stairs. There was blood on the steps. My feet were damp and chilled. My Cerepin told me it was 4:35 a.m. I’d lost hours, and here was Hannah. Hurt so bad that I didn’t understand what I was seeing.