Citadel: The Concordant Sequence

by Matthew S. Cox

  Bio-Dad didn’t risk the family not eating when he trad―duh, umm, bought the game console.

  “You’re welcome.” He grinned. “We did quite well with the stuff you found. Traded some of it this morning. Next time he goes to the Citadel, we’re going to get some decent food.”

  Kiera released her embrace and sat, resuming her attack on breakfast.

  Her father set a canvas satchel on the table, groaned, and lowered himself into the next chair.

  “It’s not the Citadel. It’s a citadel.” Kiera lifted a spoonful of beans to her mouth, but hesitated. “There’s hundreds of them. The other parents worked for the company that made them, but they couldn’t finish them before everyone would die… so they put people in those pods and made robots to keep working on the citadels. They’re all over the world. Cairns, too.”

  “You spoke in a strange tongue when you first approached me,” said Mala. “Did people talk like that before you went to sleep?”

  Kiera blushed. “Umm, no. I’m sorry. You, uhh, kinda looked like you’d speak Spanish. I’m sorry for assuming.”

  “Spanish?” asked Mala.

  She hurried two spoonfuls of beans and a chomp of bread. “There used to be different countries… Umm, think of them like big tribes. Some had different languages. People from those tribes looked different sometimes. You and Dad kinda look like you’re from Mexico or Puerto Rico or something. And Mei, and her mom… I thought she looked Japanese, but I don’t know that language.”

  “Oh. I’ve never heard those words before.” Mala smiled. “Maybe you can teach me this Spanish?”

  Kiera shrugged while chewing.

  “I did not hear this,” said Dad. “She spoke it to you before I walked over.”

  “I don’t know a lot. I only started taking it in sixth grade… but I think I had sixth grade a bunch of times.”

  “Grade?” asked Dad.

  Kiera explained school… which led into a longer explanation of virtual reality. That left her parents sufficiently confused to stop asking questions, despite Pet attempting to help clarify.

  Dad scratched at his short beard. “It is both strange and frightening to think that there could be that many more Exalted.”

  “Exalted?” Kiera raised an eyebrow while sopping bean sauce out of the bowl with a half-piece of bread.

  “Those who live within the Citadel.” Mala gestured at the wall. “The blue ones. They are Exalted. Most do not even speak to us unless their job task requires it.”

  Kiera blinked. “They’re blue?”

  “Their clothing,” said Pet. “The ones they refer to as Exalted are the descendants of those who remained within the citadels’ cryonic storage. Once the processing mechanisms created the livable perimeter―the Refuge as the people here call it―their pods opened and they tended to the machinery within, creating a separate society within the arcology.”

  “Arcology?” asked Dad. “Is that the name of its shape?”

  “No.” Pet rotated back and forth to approximate a head shake. “An arcology is a self-contained city in a large enclosed structure. Citadels are eighty-one stories tall and the lowest, widest, level is three-point-four miles on each side.”

  Kiera whistled. “Wow… it didn’t look that big from the tower. Guess it’s far away.”

  “If there are more than one, do they all have Exalted?” asked Mala.

  Pet spun around in a series of random motions. “I don’t know. The communications links between them have either been disabled or have never been activated. Only a system-level connection remains, isolated. I believe that link’s only purpose is to transmit the activation command. No human operator can access it.”

  “I won’t pretend I understood a word of that,” said Dad.

  Kiera leaned back in her chair. “She said that there’s a way for the people inside the citadels to talk to each other, but it’s turned off, so they can’t. But, if someone turns on the big switch, it should work.”

  “Oh.” Dad nodded. “Hmm. Why wouldn’t they talk to each other?”

  “Someone likely said something to make Administrator Sokolov angry. He has the temper of a small boy.” Mala shook her head.

  “So there could be more Exalted?” asked Dad.

  “They’re not exalted. They’re greedy.” Kiera scraped a few bits of sauce off the sides of her bowl. “Why do they hide in the Citadel instead of building out and sharing technology with us?”

  Mala sighed. “That, I do not know. What did you mean by big switch?”

  “I found stuff in the computer down in the cursed place,” said Kiera. “The citadels are part of a giant network of machines that were made to ‘reseed the biosphere,’ make animals come back, and clean the whole planet. If no one hits the big switch, it will take like 700 years.”

  “Clean the whole planet?” Dad raised an eyebrow. “You mean it would destroy the Torment?”

  She nodded. “Yeah… if it works. Someone thought they might blow up. That’s why they didn’t turn them on.”

  “Blow up?” asked Dad. “That sounds bad.”

  “They won’t,” said Kiera. “It’s just a crazy person.”

  “The Exalted look down on us. Risuka says the jobs we do, they pay Exalted ten times the numbers for the same work. The Administrator is the ruler of the whole Refuge.” Mala waved her arms around in a wide, sweeping gesture. “Everything inside it, safe from the Torment, follows his laws. If the world is healed, he would lose his power. You are right, child. The man is greedy.”

  “Risuka?” Kiera tilted her head.

  Mala smiled. “Your friend Mei’s mother.”

  “How would the administrator lose his power?” asked Kiera. “He’d still have all the tech, and the robots.”

  Her mother leaned back, a sad sigh leaking out of her. “The Citadel is the only source of good food, vegetables, medicine… we must work there to get numbers. Our gardens alone cannot support us. If the Earth is healed and gives us food again, we would not need the Citadel―or its numbers.”

  Teryn drummed his fingers on the table. “I do not think this ‘magic button’ will fix the world overnight. If, truly, this machine can work on the entire planet, it will take years. Do you think this man is so proud of his crown that he would wish ruin on the Earth?”

  “I do.” Mala smirked. “Look at them. The robots tried to kill our daughter for what? Finding a ruin older than Cloudfall? A tribal child cannot be permitted to see such wonders, or we shall surely question.”

  “You are angry.” Teryn put a hand on Mala’s. “If they did not wish us to see their machines, why would they let our people learn to work with and repair them? I do not think they attacked her for the simple offense of seeing that place.” He glanced at Kiera. “Did you do anything while you were there?”

  Kiera shrugged. “I tried to hit the big switch, but I got an error. The computer used to belong to my other mom… and she was an executive. VP of R&D.”

  “Vee pee of arr and dee?” asked Mala. “I do not understand.”

  “Ugh.” Kiera slapped both hands to her face and leaned her elbows on the table. “It’s complicated.”

  Kiera squatted in the garden, her toes wedged in dirt. She peered up at the tattered plastic tarp as a sudden surge of wind made it rustle and lifted her hair off her back. The temperature remained over a hundred, but the steady breeze made it tolerable as long as she stayed outside. Despite living here for two months, it felt like only days ago she’d been eager to get home from school so she could get back to playing TCS. She’d gone seven weeks without touching a controller. Kiera dug around the potato plants looking for mature spuds. Pet hovered nearby, making idle conversation and even cracking a few jokes. It evidently had enough of a sensor array to be able to help her locate potatoes worth digging for.

  Never in a thousand years had she imagined she might be rooting around dirt with her bare hands, living like some third-world kid she always saw on commercials where some used-to-be-famous old
celebrity begged for donations. Upon finding a decent-sized potato, she plucked it and dropped it in the bowl beside her before repacking the dirt.

  It surprised her how little she thought about video games. Then again, she hadn’t exactly been sent off to summer camp for two weeks, forced to ‘be outside.’ This house, this village, this farm… real. No going home after vacation. Somehow, the ‘adapt or die’ part hadn’t scared her anywhere near as much as it should have. She smiled over at Mala, crouched two rows over to check carrots.

  No way would Bio-Mom have put her hands in dirt.

  Her new mother looked up and smiled at her.

  Kiera grinned back and scooted around to the next plant, dragging the bowl. I’d kill for an hour of game time, but this isn’t so bad. It’s so weird thinking of people I met two months ago as Mom and Dad. She jammed her hands forearm deep in soil and groped around. They didn’t have to take me in… barely had enough food for themselves.

  A few hours of working in the garden while daydreaming about video games later, Kiera had midfood, eating grilled potato and some of the beans left over from the morning. After eating, she ran into the village to refill the water pitcher and lugged it back to the house. Peter, Osc, Mei, and Sparrow came by, asking if she could play.

  Mala and Teryn eagerly gave permission, before making odd faces at each other and gliding close to kiss.

  She headed off with her friends, Pet in tow, and spent the rest of the daylight hours swimming in the artificial river, since the day’s heat made playing any other games unappealing―especially if they involved running. The floating cube held the other kids’ total attention for about a half hour before they regarded it/her as another friend. When daylight began to weaken, the beckoning shouts of several parents (and hers) caused her friends to scramble off home. Kiera pulled herself up out of the water, grabbed her dress, and ran home for dinner.

  24

  Threatened

  The next morning, Kiera helped prepare breakfast by slicing up a pair of cantaloupes her mother had brought back from Norven’s, part of the trade arrangement. Since the fruits had the exact same size and shape—as though they’d been copy and pasted in reality—she figured they’d come from the Citadel. No fruits or vegetables she’d seen growing out here in Exxo looked so healthy.

  She picked up Mala’s knife, a crude blade made from a sharpened metal flange with leather cording wrapped around the end to serve as a handle. It might have once been a piece of a car or other machine, but Teryn had cut it into a knife shape and sharpened it—sorta. She sawed at the melon with it, forcing the not-quite-sharp edge into the fruit.

  This thing is dull as heck. At least it beats melon armor. She chuckled. I’ve become a peasant. I’m ‘NPC child_06.’ I’ll stand here cutting this same melon for hours and hours until the player interrupts me to talk. “Hello, I’m only a child. I don’t have a quest for you. Talk to my Dad.”

  “Huh?” asked Dad from the table.

  Kiera laughed. “I’m being silly.”

  She carried the tray (plastic and likely scavenged from a cafeteria somewhere) of melon pieces to the table and sat. While they waited for Mala, she explained the concept of fantasy games, NPCs, and quests. Teryn listened with the intensity of a four-year-old boy being educated about cake. Soon, Mala walked in with a plastic bottle of orange liquid. Another trade from the Citadel.

  “Wow, is that OJ?” Kiera blinked.

  Mala gathered some misshapen pottery cups and joined them at the table. “It is citrus water. Prevents sickness.”

  “It looks like OJ.” Kiera took her cup when offered, sipped, and nodded. “Yeah, that’s OJ.”

  Teryn raised an eyebrow. “Something more from the past?”

  “Yeah it’s―”

  Osc burst in the door and raced around to Kiera, grabbing her arm in both hands and shaking her. Dust covered him from head to toe. He gasped for breath, winded from running. “Kiera! Kiera! You got hide!”

  Mala looked up. “What?”

  Teryn grunted and forced himself upright. “What’s the matter, boy?”

  “Metal men!” Osc shook Kiera again, so hard the scrap of cloth wound about his waist threatened to fall off. “They search for girl with long, red hair. Tell reward. Big reward. From Administrator himself.”

  “Oh, no.” Kiera’s gut did a backflip. She shivered. “They’re gonna find me… No one else here has red hair.”

  Mala stared worry at the door. “No one else among all the tribes. Maybe among Exalted there are some.”

  “How many metal men?” Teryn retrieved the laser pistol from the high shelf.

  Osc bounced on his toes, still tugging on Kiera’s arm. He stared at him for a second, released his grip, and gazed at his hands. A few seconds later, he held up one hand, all five fingers splayed. “Metal men say who shows where she is gets be Exalted.”

  Mala gasped. “What could possibly make him feel that threatened by a little girl?”

  Kiera downed her OJ in three gulps, not wanting to waste such a rare treat. “I dunno.”

  “Maybe that Child of the Earth talk?” asked Teryn.

  “That’s nonsense.” Kiera shrank in on herself, shivering from fear.

  Teryn limped back to the table and pointed the laser at the door. Pet zipped down from her bedroom and hovered over her while Mala pushed melon around her plate. Osc looked back and forth among them all. He sniffed, twisted up his face, and jammed his finger in his nose, digging.

  “I don’t want you to get hurt.” Kiera bowed her head, tears of guilt pattering on her thighs. “It’s my fault. Something I did with the computer in that place. I’ll go away.”

  Osc gasped.

  “Nothin’ doin’.” Teryn backed up two steps and grasped Kiera’s shoulder, almost firm enough to hurt. “You are not going off on your own.”

  Mala stretched across the table and put a hand on Kiera’s. “You are our daughter. We cannot cast you out or let you cast yourself out. Your fate is our fate. This we knew when offering you our home.”

  “But you’re gonna get hurt,” wailed Kiera.

  “I am sensing automated patrol units moving around the east portion of the village,” said Pet. “This dwelling is at the northwest edge. Based on their search pattern, we have about six minutes before they arrive.”

  Teryn gestured at the plate. “Eat fast. Don’t waste it.”

  “I’m too scared.” Kiera grabbed her gut. “I feel sick.”

  Pet glided closer, nudging at her cheek.

  “It’s expensive food.” Mala smiled. “Good for you.”

  Kiera, still crying, picked up a melon slice and bit it. “You eat too, then.”

  “Fair enough.” Mala did the same, though she also seemed uninterested in her meal.

  “You should return to your parents.” Teryn nudged Osc to the door. “Thank you for the warning.”

  The boy gave Kiera an urgent stare and ran out.

  “I know a place where we can hide for a while. I have used it a few times on scavenge trips.” Teryn hurried to the shelves on the other side of the room and tossed some items into a satchel.

  Mala devoured her food in seconds before darting to her bed and plucking a compound bow off the wall. The peg next to it held a quiver, also made of dog-fur leather, which she attached around her waist on a cord, seating it on her hip. A dozen or so metal arrows rattled around inside.

  “I’m sorry,” said Kiera, staring into her empty plate. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know I’d get in trouble.”

  “You’re not in trouble in the sense of doing something bad,” said Pet. “You’re in trouble in the sense of being threatened by a bad person.”

  Mala chuckled. “Your little friend and I agree on something.”

  The orb of blue light that Pet floated upon intensified as it zipped around in circles. “Look out! A pair have changed pattern and are coming here.”

  Teryn lifted Kiera out of her chair, carrying her to the rear of the house. He set her d
own close to the back door and pointed at the floor by an ancient wooden dresser. “Stay down. If it gets bad, run as fast as you can and don’t look back.”

  “You’re suggesting we fight the metal men?” asked Mala. “Shouldn’t we all run out the back?”

  Teryn faced her. “No. It’s open out there. They’ll see us and pick us off.”

  “You are right.” Mala’s expression said she expected to die in either case.

  Clattering plastic approached outside.

  “Dad!” Kiera pointed at the door and flattened herself on the floor.

  A silvery-white humanoid figure started to come in, but Teryn rushed the front door, shoulder-ramming it hard enough to knock the android back. Another one battered into it, pushing in. Teryn’s feet slipped over the mismatched linoleum tiles, his one-legged stance lacking anywhere near the strength to hold it. The instant a white robot head with glowing hexagon eyes leaned in, Mala shot it with an arrow, nailing it almost at the center of the forehead with a loud clack, but the attack bounced away. Teryn grunted, struggling to hold the door.

  A second android flung itself into the mix, smashing the door hard enough to knock Teryn into the air. He bounced off the standing shelf and crashed to the floor. The laser tumbled from his grip and slid across the floor, stopping by one of the table legs. Kiera cringed from the whump her father made landing on his back a few feet away.

  Two robots stood visible in the doorway, each about the height of a man, their bodies mixed of flat white and shiny silver panels. Neither’s mouth-screen displayed an emotion line as they panned their heads back and forth.