by Jacob Whaler
“We can’t afford to take any chances.” Matt stares up at Michiko. “Please get down.”
She drops to her knees. “If they’re coming after you, they’ll be scanning with bio-units. Lying on the ground won’t help.” She stands. “I’ll stay here. Get back to the house. Fast.”
Without another word, Matt pulls Jessica up and grabs Yarah under his arm. They turn and sprint through the rows of plants, breaking out of the field, crossing the road and running up the lane to the house.
The sound of the transports thunders behind them.
Halfway up the driveway, Jessica stumbles to the pavement. She tries to get up, but can’t walk.
“Tweaked my ankle,” she says.
The transports are only half a kilometer away.
Matt drops Yarah down. “Run into the house!” he says.
“But what about Jessica?”
“Just run!”
Turning, he rushes back to Jessica and bends down. The transport is almost on top of them.
She looks up. “Leave me!”
“Never.” Matt works his arms under her shoulders and knees. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees the transport closing fast, less than 50 meters away. His hand slips into a side pocket of his pants and finds the cloaking box. With his body shielding Jessica and his finger resting against the open lid, he closes his eyes and prepares to snap it shut.
But the heli-transport shoots by overhead and keeps going until it passes out of hearing range.
Matt holds Jessica in his arms for a long time, eyes closed, heart beating so hard it’s difficult to breathe.
The sound of crunching gravel comes up the driveway.
“Like I said. Just another training flight.” Michiko walks past them to the house. “Let’s call it a day. I’m ready for dinner.”
CHAPTER 87
After dinner, Matt and Jessica do the dishes and make tea. When they return to the living room, Michiko is sitting with Yarah on the floor, showing the little girl pictures of herself when she was eight years old.
Yarah glances up. “She looked just like me when she was small.” She holds an old photograph of a girl bundled up in a child’s kimono with an overcoat. A thick fringe of fur lines the outer edge of the hood. The girl stands in front of a Shinto shrine. A deep layer of white snow covers the ground and clings to the shrine’s V-shaped roof. On one side of her a man stands in a black business suit and skinny tie. On the other side, a beautiful Japanese woman wears an elaborate kimono of pink and yellow with a bamboo chrysanthemum design. A Louie Vuitton satchel dangles from her hand.
“My mother and father on O-Shogatsu.” Michiko glances at Jessica. “New Year’s Day.” Her hand reaches for the photograph. “My mother died later that year from leukemia. This was the last picture we took together.” She slides it into an old book and returns it to the bookcase behind her.
Jessica sits at the table and looks on as Matt pours and serves tea to them all. A bowl of rice crackers stands in the center of the table.
“I am impressed,” Michiko says. “Very few Nihonjin men have the self-confidence to serve tea to a woman.”
Matt drops down next to Jessica. “I’m not a Japanese man.”
Bringing the cup up to her lips, Michiko takes a sip, barely wetting her lips, and nods. “Not bad. For a gaijin.” Then she leans back against the bookcase and cups the tea in both hands.
“I’m not a foreigner, either.”
Michiko looks up over the rim of the cup. “If you’re neither Japanese nor foreign, what exactly are you?”
“Something in between, I suppose.” He brings the steaming cup to his mouth and drinks. Choking and coughing, he pulls the cup away, spilling tea on the table. “Too hot.”
“Nekojita?” A rare smile stretches across Michiko’s face.
Jessica looks at Matt. “Translation?”
“It means cat tongue,” he says. “Acute sensitivity to hot drinks.”
“And proof that you’re more foreign than Japanese.” Michiko sips the tea again and swallows approvingly. “True Japanese know that tea is not meant for drinking.” She shakes her head and laughs as she brushes her fingers against a jax on the table. Her eyes jump up to the bluescreen on the opposite wall.
The others follow her gaze and stare up at the headline running across the top in large red letters.
Bio-implant provides first real brain-Mesh connection.
At the bottom of the screen, another headline scrolls across.
Demand for implant results in worldwide riots, calls for calm.
A view from the air of a large green lawn opens up. Beginning at the edges and extending for kilometers, hundreds of massive buildings jut straight out of the ground like columns of glass and steel. They see a small square building in the center of the lawn with a torii gate in front.
“That must be the new Shinto shrine in Central Park.” Michiko points at the wall. “I watched the dedication ceremony last month.”
A mass of humanity in white robes encircles the shrine. When the view drops to ground level, they see that it’s mostly the young, their ashen faces and red-rimmed eyes ample evidence of the fact that they rarely come out into the sun. They are moving forward, pumping fists in the air, and chanting. A line of security officers in black armor stands in front of the torii gate and fans back to surround the shrine.
“I’ll switch the audio on.” Michiko brushes her fingertip across a jax.
As the sound comes on, they hear the youth chanting.
Implant, now! Implant, now!
“Interesting,” Jessica says. “Looks like these recent converts are more interested in the technology than the religion.”
The view switches to a matrix with video of Cairo, London, Rio de Janeiro, Frankfurt, Nanjing, Bangkok and Riyadh. Teargas and burned-out vehicles litter the screen. Police in battle armor move through the streets against rioting youth. They can hear the sounds of pulse rifle discharges and crowd control detonations.
“This is exactly what Ryzaard wants.” Matt leans forward. “He’s holding back the supply of implants. Pushing the demand to fanatical levels. All part of his master plan.”
Michiko puts her half-empty teacup on the table. “It won’t be long before every man, woman and child on the planet will have one of those jewels.”
“Yes,” Jessica says. “Every man, woman and child except for those raised in the freedom camps. They’ll all recognize this as the Abomination they’ve been expecting for a generation. They’ll stay away from the shrines. Little John was a genius. Without his foresight, we’d be lost.”
Matt pours more tea for everyone. “You’re right. The Children of the freedom camps will be the only ones on the planet without the implants in a month.”
“What do you think Ryzaard will do about that?” Michiko drops a finger onto the jax and turns the bluescreen’s audio off.
Matt brings his cup up to his nose and inhales the aroma. “He won’t ignore the Children. If they won’t willingly accept the blue jewels, there will come a time when he’ll hunt them down. Kill all who refuse. It’s only a matter of when.”
“It’s already happening.” Michiko looks up from Matt to Jessica. “I still have contact with some of the freedom camp people. They haven’t all left this part of the country.”
“Can we get a message to them?” Matt reaches out for one of the rice crackers in the middle of the table.
“Of course.” Michiko gets up and walks across the room to a wooden cabinet and pulls out the bottom drawer. The scent of cedar wood floats from her direction. She finds a rectangular object wrapped in a brown blanket, brings it back to the table and turns to Jessica. “I recovered this from the submarine you came here on, after Ryzaard’s men destroyed and sank it.” Her hands pull away the blanket to reveal a black metal box with dials and knobs that mark it as twentieth-century technology.
“What is it?” Matt says.
Jessica reaches out to touch its cold surface. “It’s an ol
d ham radio. The Inuit people I traveled with used it to communicate with the other freedom camps.” She looks up at Michiko. “Does it still work?”
“I found replacement batteries at an antique store and cleaned off the corrosion. It works fine.” Michiko flips a switch. Green lights run up the side and top of the unit. “I get it out every once in a while for a chat. There’s always somebody listening.” She picks up the handset and turns a dial. A loud wave of static flows out the speakers.
Yarah puts her hands over her ears.
Michiko brings the handset close to her mouth. “This is J-Runner. Anyone out there?”
Random static fills the silence. Michiko’s fingers stretch out for the dial, hesitate and pull back.
“Hear you loud and clear, J-Runner.” The voice of a woman crackles and breaks. High-pitched whistles, or perhaps a siren, plays in the background. “This is Arctic Shark. What’s happening in the land of the rising sun?”
Michiko takes her finger off the push-to-talk button on the handset and shoots a glance at Jessica. “Arctic Shark. In the Northwest Territories. She knows one of your friends from the Inuit people, the woman you brought here. What was her name?” Her eyes float up to the ceiling, trying to remember.
“Eva.” Jessica grabs the handset from Michiko and presses the button to speak. “This is Jessica. Did you know Eva from the village where the old woman, Aanak, lived?”
For an eternity, all they hear is static.
“You knew Aanak?” The voice comes out of the black box, wavering and trembling.
“Yes,” Jessica says. “I was with both of them when they died. I still wear the walrus tooth necklace Aanak gave me.” Her fingers play with the claw-like object under her shirt.
“Then you’re her, aren’t you?” The static fades away and the voice is clear. “You’re the young Angekkok from the Kabloona, the white people to the south.”
Jessica glances around the table. “Yes.”
“Aanak said you would teach us what was coming. What we should do.” The voice begins to fade in and out.
Pressing the talk button, Jessica glances at Matt and smiles. “I’m here with the Finder. The one with the Stone.” She pulls the black unit across the table squarely in front of Matt. “I ask you, Arctic Shark, to listen to him and teach others what he says. Will you do that?”
Silence fills the space between the four of them in a small house in northern Japan and the Inuit listener in a small village in northern Canada.
“I will,” the voice says.
Jessica turns to Matt. “Now’s your chance. Tell her, tell us all, what we should do.”
Yarah’s big brown eyes stare at him from across the table.
Matt’s fingers open and wrap around the handset. “Arctic Shark, good to meet you.” He speaks slowly and deliberately. “I didn’t know I would have this opportunity, so I haven’t prepared anything in advance. I’ll just speak from the heart.”
They can hear the voice on the other end, mouth close to the microphone, breathing. “Just speak whatever comes to you, Finder. I’ll listen. From the heart.”
Matt leans back and closes his eyes for a few seconds. Then he draws in a long breath. “Where to start, that’s the question.”
“With the Abomination.” The woman’s voice on the other end offers an opening. “Has it made an appearance yet?”
“Yes, it has.”
“Is it Shinto?”
Matt shakes his head. “No. Not Shinto. There’s nothing wrong with the Japanese religion. Its aims are noble and uplifting. But the Abomination is using it as a tool to spread his work throughout the world. It should still be avoided, for now.”
They sense movement on the other end. “The Abomination is a man?”
“Yes,” Matt says. “It’s Ryzaard. The one who controls MX Global.”
“But I thought the Abomination is a kind of technology.”
Matt clears his throat. “The Abomination will use technology to enslave the people. To control their minds with his. And now we know what the technology is.”
“Tell me.”
“A small blue jewel in the shape of an animal claw.” Matt drops his hand into a pocket and feels for his Stone. “It’s being freely distributed to all followers of Shinto. It attaches to the skin and creates a direct connection between the mind and the Mesh. People are rioting to get it. Soon everyone will have one. And that is Ryzaard’s plan. We’ve seen what it can do, how it enables its users to enter the Mesh as a full sensory experience, to travel and create within it, to come together. It will be promoted as the answer to all our problems. The Way to Unity and Peace. But the Children of the freedom camps should not be deceived. As long as the Abomination is in control, his work will lead only to slavery and death of the self.”
“So that is the new message?” The woman’s voice sounds deeper and fuller now, as if she has drawn the microphone closer. “Avoid the Blue Jewel?”
Matt thinks for a moment. “Yes, I like the way you put it. Avoid the Blue Jewel.”
Static enters back into the conversation.
“Understood.” The woman’s voice starts to break up. “I’ll make sure the word gets out.”
After a long pause, Matt lays the handset down.
Michiko reaches out to switch the radio off.
Then the woman’s voice comes on again. “Just one more question. What will happen to you, Finder? What will happen to Jessica, our Angekkok?”
“No need to worry about that.” Matt’s eyes flick over to Jessica. “We’ll deal with the Abomination.” His hand finds hers. “Nothing else matters.”
“Take care.” The static makes the voice almost unintelligible. “Be safe. Over and out.”
CHAPTER 88
“Update me on the status of the implant campaign.” Ryzaard relaxes on his meditation cushion, arms down at his side, and gazes into the holo of Jing-wei floating at eye level.
Jing-wei’s eyes go to the slate in her hands. “In the last two weeks, we’ve placed two billion units.”
Ryzaard’s eyes focus wide. The Brooklyn Bridge divides into two images. “And the projected date of completion?”
“The fabrication process is growing on an exponential scale. We’ll have twenty billion units, equal to the current population of the planet, in ten more days.” Jing-wei takes a deep inhale and a long exhale. “Demand for the units is still intense and patience among the populace is running low. But, thanks to the efforts of Miyazawa, the initial riots have been quelled. The Shinto faithful worldwide have been assured that implants will be distributed as soon as available. We foresee no difficulties or resistance at this time.”
Ryzaard draws his focus to an invisible point in mid-air two feet from his nose. “Any indications that our enemies are trying to penetrate the Mesh?”
The view of the holo changes to Kalani, squatting down on his haunches on the top of his desk, staring at Ryzaard. “We run ID protocols on all new entrants into the Mesh. Standard procedure. As expected, we’ve detected some minor penetration by crime orgs. Mostly Brazilian mafia and Japanese Yakuza. We flag their credentials and monitor their actions.” He leans back and stretches his neck like a cat. “Their access can be shut down at any time. Would you like us to?”
Serenity moves across Ryzaard’s forehead. “That won’t be necessary. Invite them into the Mesh with open arms.” The muscles in his lower back unwind and relax, strand by strand. “Allow them free rein for the time being. Pull them all in so we can deal with them later. Continue to monitor Mesh traffic and update me on anything suspicious.”
Kalani’s body fades from the holo.
“Jerek,” Ryzaard says.
Jerek’s face and upper torso materializes in the holo. “Yes, Dr. Ryzaard. What can I do for you?” As he speaks, his body glistens with sweat, and he does pull-ups on a bar over his head.
“I’m glad to see you’ve found time to relax.” Ryzaard arches his back and twists his neck from side to side.
&n
bsp; “It’s been an intense couple of weeks, but the implant fabrication process is on track to complete in ten days.”
Ryzaard nods. “So I’ve heard. Excellent work.” The Stones floating above his chest light up with a low purple glow. “Any attacks on any of the manufacturing facilities? Any attempts to stop the process?”
Jerek speaks without taking a break from his pull-ups. “Nothing other than the usual opposition to the building of new plants along the coastline.” His chin rises above the bar, and he looks at Ryzaard. “But we’ve made appropriate payments to the local governments and secured all the necessary permits. Do you have any concerns?”
“None in particular,” Ryzaard says. “I just want to be sure there’s no organized opposition against us, particularly from our known enemies, as we near the finish line.”
Jerek stops and takes a deep breath. “We’ll beef up security, just to be safe. Anything else?”
“Switch me over to Diego.”
“Will do.”
The holo fades to white before a 3D view of Diego’s face comes into high relief.
“Diego,” Ryzaard says. “Any blips on the Stone location algorithm? Any indications as to where our three renegade friends may be?”
“Nothing. Complete silence.” Diego leans forward with his hands on a bluescreen. “I’ve got four cluster systems devoted to satellite reconnaissance and analysis of all surveillance camera feeds on the planet. If they step foot inside a city, we’ll know it, but so far it looks like they’re avoiding urban areas and public gatherings.”
“No need for concern.” Ryzaard’s body floats two inches above the meditation cushion. “Our position grows stronger each day. Unless they’ve given up entirely, which is possible, they will have to show themselves, eventually. Keep looking.”
“Anything else?”
Ryzaard’s hands come together, thumb tips just touching. “One more question. What’s the latest on the freedom camps, or what’s left of them?”