Attribution

by Christine Horner

  The children raucously shouted checking personal RFID beacons flashing in a rainbow of colors under their skin where vaccines were once given. Though BioIDs were not required by the government for all citizens except for certain segments of the at-risk population, aggressive programs were in place to move the public in that direction.

  “Remember, kids, only children with UniKids Club Safety Beacons are eligible. If your family didn’t follow the surgeon general’s health and safety guidelines by first deadline, then shame on you, you are not eligible to play. Get ready!”

  Dean warily bent over two cute baby skunks eagerly looking back at him from a crate at the final baby animal station. He was to go live for PNN as soon as one of the children’s safety beacons matched the RFID tagged skunks.

  “Don’t worry, their scent glands were removed,” said a young woman in khaki with a grin.

  A disqualified brother and sister, maybe ten and five years old hung their disgraced heads as they slowly walked past Dean without so much as a curious glance his way.

  The little boy grabbed his sister’s hand protectively. “Daddy was right.”

  “Hey, would you two like to pet baby skunks?” called Dean.

  “Nope,” said the boy lifting his chin proudly into the air. “Not for nothing. Come on, Audrey.”

  Dean was curious, “Wait. Mind if I ask what your daddy was right about?”

  “Them.” He nodded his head at Studebaker and Kingston. “Buncha neophytes who don’t know they sold their soul to the devil.”

  The boy’s comment made Dean smile enough to show teeth. He once knew someone who liked to buck the system.

  Dean stood up. “Come here a sec.”

  The children froze and looked at one another, unsure what to do.

  “Come on. I don’t bite, and I promise these two little guys, or girls, will behave. Rainbow promise.” Not far away, Dean heard several blows of an elephant trunk and scrambling children in a full charge. “Hurry!”

  A tentative step was enough for Dean to pull out a lifetime family pass from his pant pocket. When he did, his Ganesha elephant came out with it, hitting the ground before bouncing. “You listen to your daddy once in a while. Not every time but give your daddy a chance.”

  A tall, slender Chinese man in his military dress uniform, General Chen’s bodyguard, was faster than Dean, handing the confused children two lifetime family passes. “Compliments of the Chinese government.”

  “Thanks, China man!” Wide-eyed, the brother and sister ran off before anything weirder could happen.

  The bodyguard continued his descent to pick something up off the ground. He reached out, palming it to Dean. Looking directly into Dean’s eyes, “I believe you dropped this.”

  Dean’s blue eyes stared back into deadpan dark brown eyes before watching the long-limbed man walk away quickly. Opening his fist, his Ganesha elephant and a walnut size rock atypical of local geology lay in his palm.

  At the kids’ challenge start line, Studebaker, now standing literally beside himself, scrutinized the Chinese man who had discreetly handed a mystery object to Dean.

  Then he ran.

  CHAPTER 16

  “Look at those kids run!” Zedd pumped his arms and ran in place as if competing. Cadence thought he was cute which only encouraged him.

  Hector just shook his head. Zedd could jump in an acidic pool of water somewhere in the park for all Hector cared. In fact, he might suggest it.

  Onscreen, the first wave of older children sprinted across open green space like a string of young ponies on the first day of spring. In the middle of the herd was one nag, Loren Studebaker, a man with a plan.

  Evenly matched for the lead, an eleven-year-old girl with a fishtail braid not-so-innocently flung an elbow into her competition’s side just under his ribs. She then proceeded to bowl over a waiting Dean to get at the baby skunks to match RFID colors. Buried beneath children, Dean fought to get back on his feet, but the kids just kept coming.

  Truby glanced up from her computer. “Freeze it! Freeze the screen!”

  “What’s wrong?” asked Cadence.

  “I’m going to miss the grand prize, that’s what,” pouted Zedd, freezing the media screen.

  Positive that she recognized the man on the screen, Truby urgently punched keys to abort the upload in its final seconds.

  Dean angrily dusted himself off. Had he just let Studebaker steal his live shot? Jackass!

  Across the lawn, someone whistled loudly. Squinting in the bright sunshine, Dean’s boss nodded his head. Terrific, he thought.

  Dean dodged the next wave of younger contestants as his boss began to walk, meaning Dean was to catch up and tag along. He suddenly realized he still had the winners’ lifetime family passes in his pocket. He was about to excuse himself when he grinned instead. Revenge is sweet. Let old Stu deal with the angry mob.

  “Studebaker is quite the showboat.” Mitchell Ayers was an award-winning news director with sideburns. Somewhat soft in the middle, and hard on his talent, he mostly tried to be a fair man.

  If showboat was synonymous with jackass, then they were in agreement, Dean reasoned.

  “Listen, he’ll be with us as a guest M.C. for the rest of the DupliCity rollout. I need you to show the old guy the way we do things.”

  “You’re kidding, right?” Dean was flabbergasted. It just kept coming. “Did you see what he just did? He’s never once introduced himself to me in all the times he magically— And that’s the other thing.”

  “I’m not interested in your sob stories. He was quite popular pre-PNN and was, or is, somewhat of an icon.”

  “He doesn’t understand how news works now. I didn’t sign up to babysit.”

  Ayers stopped to look Dean over, “Neither did I, eh? Show him how to tone things down, and you’ll get your big break,” vaguely promised the Canadian. Walking away, he turned, “Get a haircut, will ya? Today.”

  Stewing, Dean watched Studebaker animatedly persuading the children to mimic their favorite animal live for the world. It was supposed to be Dean in front of that camera.

  He knew how newsrooms worked, having been in a few. They favored top talent all while placating ambitious newcomers and the shafted, usually one and the same. Dean had just gotten the shaft. Babysitting Studebaker meant he was out of action. And all because he was on probation. Dean liked to linger in a camera shot a little too long or when it wasn’t even appropriate. He never knew who might be watching. Maybe it was wishful thinking, but he hoped he’d be seen. He realized it was a fantasy, but false hope was the only thing made his world livable.

  ___

  On the kept grounds of Pete’s well-ordered Old Faithful Inn, Truby threw rocks at Young’s two hummingbird drones that taunted her with small bursts of red light from the other side of the silver fencing near the Inn. She knew their lasers could take her out any second for hacking PNN. Instead, it was as if Young was sending her a message that now they’d gotten what they wanted; she was no better than Zuckerberg.

  “Always in pairs, you redundant freaks of nature!” Out of ammo, she kicked at the fence instead.

  Unable to abort the upload, they’d gotten what they wanted. Somebody was going to get hurt, she just knew it. Ever the fool, she’d willingly played her part, even involving others. To make things worse, the man on the screen was the link to her daughter. If he was there, she was there.

  Stunned, Hector, Cadence, and Zedd could only watch the tirade from the sidewalk. Keeping a safe distance, Truby’s younger cohorts were unable to see what she threw rocks at much less why.

  “She’s gone off her nut,” Hector said before scratching at his jaw before it dropped again.

  “What should we do?” asked Cadence.

  “Wait here.”

  Truby ran down the length of the fence as Pete shuffled in with his walking stick on the fence’s exterior for a word. She greedily snatched up one more rock and took aim, nailing the second hummingbird drone as it rose slightly
above the razor wire to mock her.

  “The fence is open on both ends, Truby.”

  “Not for me.”

  Pete understood her meaning without understanding what she meant. As Truby bent over, hands on her knees to catch her breath, Pete left the way he’d come.

  He knew all too well there were some things you couldn’t take back. He’d leave Truby to hers.

  CHAPTER 17

  Truby slumped in her computer chair in total darkness. The untouched dinner plate she’d taken from the Inn’s commercial kitchen sat growing colder and less appealing by the minute. The others had been giving her some space since that morning per Pete’s instructions.

  A high-speed montage of a precocious toddler with wisps of strawberry blonde hair aging to six years old looped on her computer screen. She tapped her keyboard. The montage stopped at age four. A man’s voice coaxed the little girl playing up to the camera.

  2016 :: Ohio — “What do you want to be when you grow up, Hemmy?” asked a male voice.

  “A boy!” Hemmy innocently called out, giggling while running around in a circle, arms flailing, to burn off excess energy.

  “Well... How about a journalist, like me? Or a scientist like your mother?”

  “Thomas,” a woman’s gentle voice appealed off camera. “Let her choose.”

  Truby stopped the video, scrolling back to Thomas asking the child what she wanted to be when she grew up. Truby dialed up the man’s voice to sound feminine, then slowed the little girl’s until it dropped an octave.

  Suddenly, four loud bangs on Truby’s door interrupted her evening of solitude. The door flew open as if unhinged. Truby was more than alarmed. She thought she’d locked it. She knocked her full plate of food onto the hard floor with a loud clatter. Arms thrashed as she tried to rise defensively out of a busted chair. With more light inside her room than out, Truby was unable to make out who was there. She could only tell it was raining, and that multiple figures in all-weather ponchos stood under the eaves dripping with expectation.

  “Let’s go.”

  Recognizing Zedd’s unmistakable voice underneath the sagging hood, she physically unclenched enough to breathe.

  ___

  Loud 1970’s rebel rock music played on an antique jukebox filling the spacious Inn lobby and lounge around the massive multistory fireplace. Electric guitars, drum sets, and male voices evoked images of long sideburns, unkempt mustaches, and stringy hair. Hector and Zedd dueled with hologram pistols emitted by video game augmented reality smart glasses. On top of their heads were cheap red felt kid cowboy hats, compliments of Pete, relics dug out of a storage closet.

  Cadence danced seductively in skin-hugging yoga pants and a top that changed colors with the music, a gift from Zedd, in front of the wood-burning fire to entice one, or even better, both the boys to dance with her. The fire was illegal, but tonight they were celebrating.

  “Is your game as good as this?” she asked.

  The boys paused to regard her appreciatively, blinked twice, then returned their gunfight.

  “I’ll be there in a minute, hot stuff.”

  “Not if I kill you first!” Hector lunged left to pursue Zedd hiding behind the east side of the fireplace.

  Cadence sighed, giving up on the lost cause. She joined Truby at the bar who was mournfully slamming down her fourth Grey Goose over ice. Disheveled, her chin-length hair didn’t look like it had seen a comb or brush that day or the previous.

  “I’ll just put this away.” Behind the bar, Cadence slowly reached toward Truby. When Truby didn’t object, she capped the vodka bottle, returning it to its empty slot.

  “Fast flickering images... That’s all we get,” Truby murmured. “Just give me my life back.”

  “We crashed PNN’s party. That’s something. The most televised moment in history hacked! Now the world knows the truth about WREN.” Cadence eyed Pete working a crossword puzzle at a table. “Pete, be a good boy and ask Truby to dance.”

  “I’m not a good boy,” Truby slurred this time.” I promise I won’t cause any more trouble. I’ll raise alpacas.”

  When someone turned the jukebox to full volume, Cadence moved as if the devil had taken command of her body. “No more pity party for you!” Tugging on the mature woman’s arm, “Who knows? Maybe we changed the world today.”

  Hector chased Zedd into the dining room. Rough-housing around and between tables, they knocked over chairs as they slid across polished oak floors in socks.

  “You can’t just quit, loser!” yelled Hector.

  “Priorities, man. Always walk away with the better prize,” said Zedd.

  “If you’re fighting over me,” Cadence demurred, “Truby is my date tonight.”

  It looked like it was going to escalate when Zedd locked eyes with Hector, giving his head a nod that said “look-see.” Ambushing a never-out-of-uniform Pete, they picked him up out of his chair by his armpits.

  “Relax, Pete. Drop the puzzle.”

  Refusing at first, his body still rigid, Pete slowly began to drop his knees as they carried him toward the women. “Now that’s one piece of advice every man should follow. Always make it about the woman. Women? Even better,” said Pete surrendering with a smile.

  Swaying in the center of a huddle surrounded by Cadence, Hector, Zedd, and even Pete, Truby couldn’t understand what there was to celebrate. She could only lose herself in her pain, the effects of alcohol, and life in all its strangeness. Whatever this was, Truby knew one thing. This moment was as temporal and fleeting as she was. Who and what was she? That was the million-dollar question.

  The music overtaking the five points of light and darkness, they moved in singularity. But somehow, together, they managed to find the beat.

  CHAPTER 18

  High in DupliCity’s sky tower, blinking lights and flashing lasers competed with the evening stars to be the best and the brightest. It was a blinged-out black-tie affair. A private celebration, top global leaders busily congratulated one another in a cacophony of many languages. BioIDs with ear buds translated international tongues seamlessly into the universal language of affluence and power. The evening was just getting started.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, if I could have your attention, please,” announced Loren Studebaker using a mic-less audio projection device connected to his BioID.

  V.I.P.s wore crystal-structure inspired evening gowns and silk suits in gradient color that changed with lighting conditions to enhance the human form in all the right places. They began to bio-locate assigned seats at six-person tables organized around the stage like a flower with an elevated circular center. Slender silver and gold gender neutral robots continued to gracefully glide around organic and inorganic objects, dispensing an unending river of crystal flutes filled with expensive Armand de Brignac Brut Rose champagne.

  The stage was lit from above and below by soft glowing light to illuminate the Master of Ceremony, Loren Studebaker. Like a life-sized collector’s edition wedding cake topper, transparent mirrors gave the illusion he was giving a 360-degree, forward-facing presentation to every guest. His suit was a white Jodhpuri, meant for nuptials, but despite the gaffe, its pairing with his perfectly coifed silver hair made for a stunning mature man.

  “Thank you, friends.” The circular stage rotated prompting Studebaker to remember to offer the appropriate acknowledgments. “President Cane, wonderful to see you. General Stenberg of the Global Security Council, couldn’t have done it without you. Mayor Kingston, hello.” Studebaker clapped his hands together, “I thought it was an honor just to receive an invitation to Vegas. I mean Sector M9-48B, New Las Vegas. Nevada. U.S.A. General Frohm, good evening, sir.” He winked, “So many Generals and nary a war in sight. I’d call that an oxymoron.”

  Flanked by Lt. General Young, General Frohm simmered at a front-row table next to President Cane. Young knew he simmered because it was rare for Frohm not to simmer. Young’s job was to be the lid to Frohm’s pot that knew when to release a little p
ressure.

  “What planet is this oxy-moron from? He’s an asset?” asked General Frohm.

  “No, sir. I can find out who hired him.”

  Studebaker continued off-script, “If I could go back and pick who I wanted to be when I grow up, would I have picked me? It’s a tough call.”

  The bored-looking crowd didn’t seem interested in Studebaker’s aggrandizement. These were people of action. Several dignitaries booed, a few catcalled. An even smaller number held up champagne glasses and cheered. For him or more champagne, no one knew for sure.

  “Don’t bother. He’s obnoxious as hell; I’ll give him that. A jester for the masses.” Frohm leaned in, lowering his voice, “Are we close?”

  “Too close for comfort, if you know what I mean, sir. Gives me the willies just being here.”

  “Keep your willy in your pants, Terrance. At least for the next thirty-six hours,” offered Frohm, doling out unsolicited fatherly advice.

  It took all of Young’s willpower not to roll his eyes. Ike would have cold-cocked him. He silently wondered how much longer he’d have to wait for Frohm’s job.

  ___

  Dean paced like a honey badger trying to climb a slick steel pole to get to a beehive as he watched Studebaker on a wall of video monitors in the regional PNN Media Control Tower. The control room, filled with a dozen production crew members, ensured the live global simulcast went as scripted down to the second. Initially, Dean thought Studebaker had listened to what he’d said in the preshow newsroom briefing. Dean knew he was about to get burned.

  “Then who would I be? Hmm... Well, let me tell you.”

  Dean pushed a button on the nearest manned console. He practically yelled into Studebaker’s earpiece connecting him to the control room, causing the icon to flinch in front of billions of people. “Just make the introduction, Stu. This isn’t about you or a ratings book. You’ve got the attention of the entire world.”

  “Stu” stumbled, his train of thought broken. His silky voice and smile faded slightly before quickly recovering, “I, oh, well. I was just reminded that the entire world is waiting for me to introduce one of the geniuses behind the Global Security Council’s WREN initiative. Alright.”