Life is a Beautiful Thing (4-Book Box Set)

by Harmon Cooper

  Her face filled with disgust.

  “Get in! We’re going to Mexico as a family!” he said, smiling out at her.

  Nelly: What the hell did you give him?

  Noah: I told you, Truth XO.

  Nelly was too furious to move. Sitting in the back of the aeros was one of the men responsible for unjustly imprisoning her. Through Sauria’s connections, Antimeria had committed an unspeakably vile criminal act. It highlighted just how corrupt the FCG and its most powerful military-industrial partners had become. The thought that a businessman could have someone jailed on no charges at all was sobering, frightening, nausea-inducing.

  Rebel woke up, looked around, scrunched up her face and produced a volume of noise that was totally at odds with her diminutive size.

  Despite having been treated with a course of drugs and synthetic hormones to dry up her milk, Nelly felt an odd pang in her breasts.

  “Oh no,” Antimeria said, “the baby is crying! Noah what do we do?”

  Noah opened the back door, extracted the wiggling, thrashing air-raid siren from her infant seat and checked her diaper. “She’s wet, poor little lamb, and hungry too. Hang on Sweetness, and Papa Noah will make it all better.” He grabbed Rebel’s diaper bag, which was the size of a five-day assault pack. It was a very limited edition creation by Jurassic Packs of Patagonia from de-extincted Phorusrhacid hide, one of only three world-wide. Antimeria had commissioned it as soon as he’d found out Nelly was pregnant.

  Noah popped the tab on a self-heating bottle of McStarbuck’s Finest Special Reserve Sustainably Derived, Ethically Produced Genuine Synthetic Kosher-Vegan-Halal Almond-Soy Breast Milk Substitute, and while it was warming to 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, laid out a hand-loomed cashmere-alpaca receiving blanket on the seat next to Antimeria. With a long-practiced, balletic economy of motion, the Humandroid laid the baby on the blanket, stripped off the full-to-capacity diaper, gently and thoroughly cleaned her up, anointed her against diaper rash and then encased her baby nether region in a brand-new, downy-soft, pre-warmed diaper – all the while chuckling and cooing and blowing raspberries on her tummy.

  Nelly hovered over his shoulder, alternately glaring hate and death at Antimeria and grimacing at the sight, scent, and surprising quantity of USDA Prime baby poo that her daughter had generated.

  Antimeria grinned at the baby and went, “Awww … ”

  “Who’s a good baby? Who’s a good baby? You are, yes you are!” Noah cooed at Rebel as he strapped her back in the infant seat. She waved her arms in excitement when she saw the bottle of McStarbuck’s Finest, and he latched it into the deployment arm and brought it to her lips. She locked on like a Soyuz docking with the joint Russian-Indian-Chinese Space Station.

  Rebel was in the best place a baby could be outside of the womb; warm, dry, and slamming formula down her neck. The only way it could have been better would have been with a tiny pollute mask and a jolt of Fuzzy-Warm-Tickle-Cuddle-Bunnymilk.

  “Please, Nelly, get inside. We need to cross the border.” Noah placed his hand on her shoulder. “There’s no telling how long we’ll be able to keep all this on the down-low. And … ” He glanced left and right as if Middle o’ Nowhere, Arizona was infested with eavesdroppers, and whispered behind his hand. “I killed the three security guards with these dreadful arm PHASRs.”

  He stopped whispering and held both his forearms out to Nelly, indignation written large across his face. “And just look at the burn holes in my forearms – just look! They’ll never be the same, ever, and this will happen every time I use them! Every time! What’s the point in even getting them repaired? I might just as well get some big, ugly green anchor tattoos and … ” He stopped, bounced on the balls of his feet and flapped his hands. “Focus, Noah. Focus. Focus.” He continued, “Anyhoo, I hid the bodies in the walk-in freezer, but when MercSecure or ExEx sends someone around, they’ll surely find them. We need to hurry.”

  She got into the aeros, refusing to turn and look at Rebel or Antimeria. An almost non-existent motherly part of her wanted to see the baby, but the thought of seeing her soon-to-be-dead-ex-husband twisted something in her gut. No, she’d keep her eyes on the airlane, or out the side window, just as she had in Colorado. She could bond with Rebel once Antimeria was in the trunk.

  “Family adventure time!” Antimeria said as Noah steered the aeros into the crystal blue sky.

  FORTY-FIVE∞

  For once everything is going to plan. Nelly and Noah have breached the border, I’m in a new, non-Carloza body (still pumped about this) and the FCG is about to get their pee-pee whacked for the first time in maybe ever. Ball-taps for Christmas this year, boys!

  (Needless to say, I’m in Manuel’s office feeling pretty smug about the whole thing.)

  A Frida motif now rests in the corner, to be replaced by something different. I never quite understood Frida, the unibrow queen fond of selfies, but if art was made to be understood it wouldn’t be art, and haughty, pretentious poseurs wouldn’t pay los dineros grande for the opportunity to own it and show it off to other haughty, pretentious poseurs. (Or something like that). Yeshi, my Yeshi, droid of my dreams – yes, she’s next to me with a satisfied grin on her face. The video feed adds a subtle layer of blue to her e-skin, making her look the most robotic she’s ever looked to me.

  Homo sapiens – Homo Machina. One wired by God the other wired by Man; one the essence of the future, the other the essence of the past. Yeshi moves her bangs out of her face and turns to me. “What?” she asks, aware that I am looking at her. Her single dimple shows as her lips part. “What is it?”

  An incoming message appears on my iNet screen from an anonymous contact.

  “I’m getting a message,” I tell both Manuel and Yeshi.

  “Open it,” Manuel says, his eyes fixated on the LCD screen, watching as Noah finishes stuffing Antimeria in the trunk of the aeros.

  I accept the message and I gasp.

  “What is it?” Yeshi asks.

  “The message … the message is from Richard Hewman!”

  “Listen to this,” I say, reading the message aloud: “Hello Anonymous One, Meme Lamar, I’ve decided it’s time to contact you.”

  Manuel says, “I thought he was dead … that’s the Humandroid inventor, right?”

  Another message appears.

  “I’ll cc the message to both of you,” I say, closing my eyes.

  Richard Hewman: Just to be clear, this is not a prank or a joke. I will send you evidence over the iNet cloud. I am alive and well, living in Cuba with an old friend of yours.

  Me: An old friend?

  Richard Hewman: Tim7. He said you’d remember him.

  Me: Oh, yeah. He was a pretty big 8====D the last time we met.

  Richard Hewman: I think it would be good if we met, to discuss things in person.

  Me: Oh, yeah?

  Richard Hewman: Indeed. We have much to discuss.

  Me: Meet? Where? Discuss what?

  Richard Hewman: In Cuba. We need to discuss our war against the FCG.

  Me: Our war? Are you in this too?

  Richard Hewman: I’ve been up against the FCG ever since MercSecure’s predecessor tried to disappear me.

  Me: How do you know about me then?

  Richard Hewman: Tim7 told me about you. I’ve been keeping my eye – well, actually Yeshi’s eye through her ocs – on you ever since.

  Me: You’ve been watching me?

  (I think of all the things he must have seen, from giving birth to Nelly’s baby, to fucking, to pollute partaking – I’m not proud of all I’ve done, but at least I can say I’ve put on a damn good show! Sometimes it feels like, somebody’s watching me. I guess I was right all along!)

  Richard Hewman: Only when Yeshi sends a distress signal.

  Me: A what?

  Richard Hewman: It is something that all Humandroids do without knowing they are doing it. It allows for their ocular feed to be tapped if the signal is activated. Even the FCG doesn’t know about
this hack.

  Me: I see.

  Richard Hewman: I was monitoring the incident back at the Italian restaurant, before you made your way to Mexico.

  “He’s the one who rescued Nelly,” Manuel says aloud. “He’s the one that took her dead body and fixed it in Oakland. Now it comes together…”

  Me: You’re like the man behind the curtain!

  Richard Hewman: I wouldn’t say that… but yes, I have been dabbling as of late.

  Me: So you want me to come to Cuba?

  Richard Hewman: No, I want you, Nelly, Yeshi and Noah to come to Cuba.

  Me: What about the baby?

  Richard Hewman: Rebel too.

  I open my eyes and turn to Yeshi. “What do you think?”

  The smile on her face is the biggest smile I’ve seen since meeting her. “I think we’d better book some tickets to Havana.”

  Epilogue∞

  The previous night at Pollution Club 512 in LA.

  “Well, that got out of hand.”

  Keva stood on the tilting dance floor of Pollution Club 512, clad in a skimpy dress holding a pollution mask dripping blood. Lying on the floor in front of her was a semi-nude man with tremendous, unspeakable head trauma. She was slightly wasted, yet stable enough to do what she did best – break things and hurt people.

  “We need to go. Now!” Monique said. Most of the club-goers had already cleared out. A few of the more intoxicated individuals cowered in the corners, trying to hide behind their pollution masks. The plush cubes surrounding the dance floor flashed with currency symbols. Rinchi was dragging her leg on the opposite side of the room, trying to get away from the crazed assassin.

  “I’m just getting started,” Keva said.

  “Law Enforcement is on their way; you try any of your shit with them and they will kill you dead.”

  “I’d like to see them try.”

  “You don’t have any weapons.”

  “I am the fuckin’ weapon!”

  The DJ, a man atop the stupa-like DJ booth, tried to crawl down the stairs leading to the exit. One of the bartenders, a dreadlocked guy in a pair of Leaks, hit the exit door hard, stumbling into a long corridor.

  “DJ Shitty Choons,” Keva called across the room, “You’d best get back to your post and play a real ghetto-blaster, something that will really get this place moving. If you don’t, I’ll use your balls for a bow-tie, verstehen-sie?”

  The DJ scurried up the stairs, fumbling for a moment with his rig. Not seconds later, the bass sounded and the air filled with a danceable grindsmash track. He raised his hand in the air, feigning enjoyment (as all DJs do) and trying to show how hard it is to DJ electronically (as all DJs do). He couldn’t conceal that he was weeping in crotch-moistening fear as he put on his show.

  “That’s the one,” Keva said, bobbing her head as she approached Rinchi.

  The Humandroid glanced around for any expedient weapon – nada. She cursed herself, knowing it had been a stupid idea to go clubbing with Keva, who’d gotten jealous of the guy that Rinchi was dancing with and had killed him and ruined her leg.

  Rinchi: Monique. Make her stop.

  Monique didn’t reply, which pissed her off even more. Monique’s brother Clove was already on Rinchi’s shit-list for selling her out in Iraq; Monique was just about on it now, too – presuming that Keva didn’t permanently and ineluctably disable her first.

  Keva planted her high heel directly in front of Rinchi’s face.

  “Dancing with other boys,” she clucked, her eyes bloodshot and furious. “And here I thought you were mine.”

  An idea came to Rinchi that she wouldn’t have tried even a day ago. “I am yours,” she said, rolling to her back. “I’ve been yours since Mexico.”

  “What did you say?” A look of utter confusion spread across Keva’s sharp face.

  “I am yours.” Rinchi raised her hand, running it along Keva’s exposed cyborg leg covered in e-skin.

  “Mine?”

  “Yes.” Rinchi raised her hand to MercSecure’s top rep, letting it helplessly dangle at the wrist. “Please, help me up.” Her eyes dilated as she scanned Keva to see if she was buying it. Keva normally wouldn’t buy a false flag operation, but perhaps the pollutes she’d huffed, in addition to exacerbating her usual shithouse rat craziness made her more susceptible to believing what she wanted to believe.

  “Help you?”

  “Yes, I want to … to be with you.”

  “Be with me?” Keva hesitated.

  Using one of the plush currency cubes, Rinchi lifted herself off the ground, hobbling onto her good leg. She shrugged, giving Keva a playful grin. “You sure can be violent.”

  “You don’t want to kill me?”

  “I’ve wanted to before, but right now, I just want you to hold me.”

  “Hold you?” Keva was genuinely flabbergasted, evident in the baffled look on her face.

  Monique harrumphed, “Police here in two minutes tops. I already called an aeros. It’s waiting outside. Wrap it up, you two.”

  “Please,” Rinchi asked.

  Keva took a step closer to Rinchi and looped her arm under her shoulder. A woman in body paint darted across the room with her hands over her head. “Don’t kill me! Don’t kill me!” she screamed.

  “Thank you,” Rinchi whispered, moving in to kiss Keva passionately.

  Monique watched wearily as the two kissed, as Keva’s hand moved to Rinchi’s lower back.

  “Please,” Monique said, “you two can continue this in the aeros.”

  “Let’s,” Rinchi said, giving Keva her most provocative smile. She pretended to kiss her and stopped. “In the aeros.”

  “Fine,” Keva said, breathing heavily. Her killer instinct had morphed into something completely sexual, from one extreme to another. She kissed Rinchi again, pulling the droid’s hair back with her free hand.

  Rinchi licked her lips. “In the aeros.”

  The three MercSecure reps made their way outside, Keva helping Rinchi along the way. They passed a few patrons lying on the floor covering their heads, as if shielding themselves from incoming fire. A man with his hair slicked back and a shirt that read damn the feedback stumbled by, a pollution mask stuck sideways on his face making it impossible for him to see straight.

  “Shotgun,” Monique said, circling around to the front passenger seat of the driverless aeros. Rinchi and Keva got into the back and Keva immediately kissed Rinchi, running her hands all over her body.

  “MercSecure headquarters,” Monique said aloud.

  A beeping sound confirmed her request as the vehicle lifted into the air.

  “No,” Keva said, breathing heavily, “to my place.”

  “Drop me off first,” came Monique’s reply.

  “Fine, but hurry.”

  Keva’s hand fell onto Rinchi’s crotch. From there it moved north, lightly dancing over her breasts. For her part, Monique kept her eyes on the dashboard, ignoring the two reps.

  Rinchi’s hand came around Keva’s neck and she started squeezing as they kissed, lightly at first.

  Keva tensed up. “What are you … ?”

  Smack!

  Rinchi brought her closed fist into Keva’s face, pulled back and punched her again.

  Smack!

  “Hey!” Monique shouted from the front seat. “No fighting back there! Don’t make me pull this aeros over! Shit! Disable all video recording!” she told the vehicle as an afterthought.

  Too late.

  Rinchi and Keva were like two rabid wolverines on crack in a Cuisinart, climbing over one another, punching, kicking, biting and scratching. Keva grabbed a fistful of Rinchi’s hair, flipping her face around. She ground against the droid’s back, cracking her in the back of the head with the knuckles of her right hand.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Rinchi hissed.

  “Making you my bitch, Bitch,” Keva said, punching and dry humping the droid. “You tricked me!”

  Rinchi managed to kick back with her
good leg, connecting with Keva’s side. MercSecure’s top rep twisted over, reaching for the door of the aeros. She was quickly pulled backwards – Rinchi now gripped a handful of her white hair.

  “Lock door,” Monique said to the self-driving aeros. “Lock door!”

  “What the hell!?” Keva called up to her.

  Rinchi did a quick vitals scan. She was hand-to-hand with Keva now, trying to overpower her. With a normal human it would have been possible, but with Keva’s mods, their strengths were matched. They continued to squirm over one another, each trying to gain the advantage and end the fight. They pounded everything they could reach; each other, the seat, the door panels – everything. The aeros autopilot was most unhappy as it tried to maintain straight and level flight with three hundred pounds of randomly shifting weight bouncing around the cabin.

  Keva spit into Rinchi’s eyes, but that didn’t seem to do anything other than bring her head close enough for Rinchi to give her a solid head-butt.

  “Bitch!” Keva screamed as blood streamed out of her nose, arcing in the air and splattering on the inside of the windshield. Monique kept her eyes trained on the pair of gladiators locked in mortal combat in the back seat, and did her best to avoid picking up any collateral damage, although her new club wear and the little flapper purse she’d just bought were speckled with blood and Humandroid coolant.

  “Knock that shit off!” Monique shouted to no avail.

  The two reps ignored her and hammered on each other until Keva was a pulpy mess, her hair pink from her own blood, and Rinchi was nearly out of power, with a non-functional leg, a twitchy arm and a dimming ocular feed.

  The aeros descended as they approached the massive MercSecure west coast office, an architectural masterpiece shaped like a large ring. The vehicle hovered over the floating parking lot powered by reverse turbine engines. The low hum of the turbines could now be heard inside the vehicle.

  “You two, OUT!” Monique barked.

  The back doors opened on either side of the aeros and Keva surged forward. Her body connected with Rinchi, tossing both of them out of the aeros. Keva tried to punch her mid-air but the fall was too sudden; they hit the gravel hard, Rinchi flopping like a fish.