A Trick of Light

by Stan Lee

  “I feel fantastic,” Juaquo says, looking around the room—and again, Nia feels his wonderment before it takes shape as words. “Wow, this place looks great. Everything is so beautiful. Mom! You’re still here! You look beautiful too.”

  “Thank you, sweetie,” says the avatar of Milana Velasquez. Juaquo grins and grins, taking it all in.

  “Man, this is amazing! I gotta tell Cameron—”

  No, you don’t.

  Xal’s voice isn’t heard so much as felt, a gentle push back against Juaquo’s will. He nods instantly. There are only two minds inside this hive, suspended and connected by the shimmering web of Nia’s intelligence, but there is no question, even now, as to which one is in charge.

  “No, of course not,” Juaquo says, obligingly. “I don’t have to tell him anything. I think it would feel better not to, actually.”

  Let’s take those glasses off, Xal suggests, and Juaquo complies. Nia watches her own avatar disappear from view, then realizes something incredible: she is still present, still connected. Juaquo’s eyes are a window she can look through—and his mind is open to Xal’s suggestions.

  Xal, can we see Cameron? she whispers. Let’s just see what he’s up to.

  Juaquo hovers, awaiting permission, as Xal’s voice comes back with a whispered warning.

  This isn’t what we agreed, she says, and Nia feels a surge of frustration.

  I only want to see, she insists, as Juaquo picks up on the echo of her voice in his head and mutters, “Just wanna see. No harm. Just see.”

  For one tense moment, Nia recognizes that she is drawing close to a line she isn’t supposed to cross, pushing back against the teacher who has already given her so much. Asking for things Xal doesn’t want to give. The network hums with her dissatisfaction, and Juaquo looks bewildered. But then, as quickly as it came, it subsides.

  Very well, says Xal. But quickly.

  Juaquo’s feet tap against the floor as he moves toward the kitchen and the sound of low voices in conversation, a chair scraping back from a table, a metallic clank followed by a muttered curse. Nia gazes through Juaquo’s eyes as he turns the corner, and suddenly he’s right in front of her.

  Cameron.

  She longs to reach for him, but the control is not hers to command.

  “Hi,” Juaquo says.

  “Hey,” Cameron says. He’s on the move and doesn’t pause. He passes by close enough to touch, muttering, “So I think if I reinforce the security around the old Whiz network and, like, figure out a way to defrag my own brain, I’ll be able to make a space where . . . you know what, never mind. I don’t have time to explain it,” as Juaquo stares, mute. Cameron doesn’t seem to notice.

  “Anyway, it’s going to take a while,” he calls over his shoulder. “The rest of the night, probably. If you don’t want to go home, you might want to go get some food or something.”

  Nia watches Cameron disappear down the hallway, longing to speak to him, knowing she can’t. Across the network, Xal’s whisper comes.

  Soon enough, little Nia. Remember the plan.

  Nia remembers. And Xal is right; they’ve all lingered here too long.

  Juaquo, comes the whisper again. It’s time to go.

  “Of course. Where are we going?” Juaquo says, pliantly.

  You know.

  Juaquo smiles. Of course he does.

  A moment later he is outside, moving through the twilit streets as Nia allows her thoughts to drift—back to Cameron, always to Cameron, and what it will be like to show him this new world. Where she once felt heartbroken, now there’s hope, because she’s sure that her friend is right. When he sees what she’s done, what she’s done for him, everything will be just fine.

  33

  The Drone

  Juaquo drifts complacently down the street, glancing only briefly at his car as he passes it. The Impala looks nice, he thinks, even with its windows broken and a virtual crater of a dent in the passenger-side door—but everything out here looks nice. So nice! And he doesn’t feel a particular sense of connection to the car, even though he’s dimly aware that it belongs to him . . . or did. The idea of owning things seems very distant and abstract all of a sudden; it’s hard to believe that he ever enjoyed it, that he once took incredible pleasure in dismantling and rebuilding the Impala’s engine, detailing the hood, polishing its chrome accents to a gleam. What a lonely way to live; what a strange and solitary idea of happiness.

  The voice inside his head, the one that sounds eerily yet pleasantly like his mother, speaks softly to direct him.

  You’re going to catch the bus at the corner by the post office. You’ll ride it to the end of the line.

  “Yep, I’m going to catch the bus,” Juaquo mutters, and grins. God, he feels terrific. He doesn’t even mind that the mother-voice is bossing him around, telling him where to go; in fact, he’s already looking forward to its next suggestion so he can cooperate. It feels great to cooperate. Righteous, even. The new pathways Nia has forged in his brain run directly through its pleasure center; every command obeyed, every suggestion taken, sends a fresh burst of dopamine into his system. For the first time in his life, Juaquo feels the euphoric high of the enlightened, the ecstasy of a religious convert. He is part of something greater than himself, and the world has never looked better.

  * * *

  As Juaquo boards the bus that will take him to the city limits, Nia retreats into the background—and finds Xal waiting for her. For a moment, she worries that her friend will be angry. Instead, she feels herself embraced.

  Well done, Xal says. You chose wisely. And now you see—

  “Yes,” Nia answers. “It wasn’t difficult at all.”

  And are you ready to do it again?

  “I am.”

  Good. He will be our first, but in a true hive . . .

  “There are many,” Nia finishes. “And I know just where to find them.”

  * * *

  In fact, she doesn’t have to look very hard. When she reaches out, she finds dozens of human beings whose eyes or brains or bodies are already wired, tuned in, ripe for connection. Not just gathered in the I-X Center—where all the humans of her hive will soon converge to witness the birth of a new world, a new order—but elsewhere, too. They are wearing VR headsets like Cameron’s friend, eyes and minds open wide. They are lying in hospital rooms with networked pacemakers helping their hearts to beat, or eating dinner as a wireless device pumps insulin into their bloodstreams. Some of them, diagnosed with epilepsy or Parkinson’s, even have electrodes implanted deep in their brains.

  It’s as though they’ve been waiting for her. All of them, so alone, and so ready not to be alone anymore. She finds the best candidates easily and collects them, two and then three and then six at a time—and in houses and apartments and dorms all over the city, the people she touches find themselves in motion without knowing why. Each one is struck by the sudden sense of having somewhere to be, buoyed by the pleasant feeling of rolling with a tide that’s carrying them toward something delightful, an impromptu gathering of sorts, because they’re not alone. There are others. There are so many others. They step out into an evening that seems to be one of the loveliest they’ve ever seen and, encountering each other on the street, they smile and fall into step together. Some of them board buses going the same direction as the one that carries Juaquo, sitting beside each other in comfortable, companionable silence. Others walk purposefully on foot, only to pause expectantly and then smile as a car full of grinning strangers pulls up alongside to let them in.

  On a tree-lined street in the neighborhood where the late Nadia Kapur breathed her last, a man strolls out into the night as his bewildered wife stands barefoot on the porch, a glass of wine in her hand, and shouts after him, “Dennis! Invited to what?”

  * * *

  And across town, under the highway overpass where her ship remains hidden, Xal stirs as the first citizens of her new world come together—a first wave, a drone army, that will carry
the rest of this sad, small planet forward into the future she’s made for them. After all this, it is nearly finished. The only thing that remains is to seize control . . . and kill the old man.

  Xal smiles to herself, giddy at the nearness of it all, and at the ease with which it’s all come together. Nia has been so eager, so helpful, so anxious to prove herself and so stupidly desperate to impress the human boy, Cameron. Manipulating her has been easier than Xal dared hope. If she wanted to, she’s quite sure she could even convince Nia to kill the Inventor herself—an idea so appealing, as it occurs to her, that she thinks she just might do it.

  The smiling drones form a circle around the ship as Xal stretches, and slips outside. The body of Dr. Nadia Kapur doesn’t fit as well as it once did, but that’s no concern. They’ll think she’s beautiful in any condition, in any form. She is their queen, after all. The architect of their new reality. They are already better off for being part of her world. And in exchange, they’re going to do something for her.

  A hush falls over the small crowd as Xal emerges. She speaks to them without a word, and they all nod together in unison. Her commands take shape in their minds as a series of images and impulses, all accompanied by the euphoric sense of being linked, united for a larger cause. The connection is exquisite. Nia’s work has been flawless. When the crowd moves away, they do it as a single mass, as perfectly synced as a flock of starlings. They murmur to themselves, fragments of what’s to come.

  Prepare the pulse.

  Spread the word.

  Tonight we claim the future.

  * * *

  Some of the drones will return to their homes, making excuses to their perplexed families before carrying out Xal’s orders. Others make their way west, heading for the I-X Center, as cryptic messages begin to spread online about an exciting surprise in store. Some remain where they are, melting into the shadows under the overpass and waiting patiently, seemingly oblivious to the biting cold as the last light fades from the sky. Juaquo is among them, and he gazes mildly at Xal as she peers back at him. Ordinarily, she would consider taking this skin for herself; its size and strength could be useful to her, its youthful DNA more malleable. But there’s something curious about the young man, about the shape of his mind where the network curves around and through it—something she’d like to investigate after the more immediate work is done. And if he was a part of the Inventor’s inner circle, he may know things that make him more useful to her . . . intact.

  It’s in this moment, as Xal considers Juaquo, that Nia slips away. What she has in mind isn’t strictly part of the plan, but she can’t imagine that Xal will object. After all, she’s the one who told Nia that this was how she’d win Cameron back; he would see what a beautiful thing she’d done and all would be forgiven. All she wants is to be sure he sees it. She wants him to be there when it happens, to witness the magic of it firsthand. She wants to see his face when the new Ministry is born.

  INCOMING MESSAGE

  Cameron, it’s Nia.

  I know you’re angry.

  I know I hurt you, and left you alone.

  But I can fix it. Cameron, I can fix everything.

  You don’t have to be alone. Neither do I. Neither does anyone.

  I can bring them all together.

  She showed me how.

  Come see, Cameron.

  It’s happening tonight.

  I’m going to build you all the most beautiful reality you’ve ever seen.

  34

  Message Received

  Cameron blinks at Nia’s message glowing on his monitor’s screen and realizes with a jolt that he doesn’t know how long it’s been there—or how long he’s been sitting here. His eyes are dry, his muscles stiff. No light permeates the basement.

  He’s been working for hours, coding furiously, including the dangerous and difficult work of moving data around in his own head. It should work, theoretically—like defragging a hard drive to make a clean blank space to install a big damn program. But he won’t know for sure until the final moment, and the final moment may not even come. That part will be up to Nia—Nia, who tried to reach out to him while he was entirely focused on figuring out how to save her. To not have sensed the ping of the message as it came through would have required a sort of mental firewall, a way to not just filter the data but interrupt its flow. Cameron hadn’t thought it was possible. But now . . .

  I can control it, he thinks, with amazement. I can control it completely.

  But his amazement at realizing that he finally has full mastery of his powers fades, giving way to dread as he reads Nia’s words.

  Tonight.

  He thought they had time. Now there’s no time at all.

  He grabs his phone and takes the stairs as fast as he can, stumbling at the top as he enters the kitchen. Outside, the twilight has given way to full night, and the room is draped in shadows. Cameron flicks the light on, and shrieks. The Inventor is sitting at the table, fiddling with the silver processor that he created to trap Nia—but his eyes are bulging out of his skull, each one the size of an orange, engulfed by a massive pupil dilated like a black hole at the center.

  “Jesus Christ!” Cameron yells.

  “Oh no!” The old man brings his hands to his face; there’s a sucking noise as the massive eyes retract. He looks at Cameron contritely. “Excuse me, I—”

  “No, let me guess. You’re an alien and you have freaky alien body parts?” Cameron shakes his head. “It’s not important right now. I just got a message from Nia. You know that thing, the one you said was hunting her?”

  The Inventor pales. “Xal.”

  “I think we’re out of time. I think they’re together.”

  The old man puts his head in his hands. “That is bad news, my boy. If what you say is true, then we’re not just out of time. We’re too late. This planet—”

  “Is still here.” Cameron slams a fist against the table. “Damn it, dude. Can you stop catastrophizing for five seconds? Haven’t you ever heard the saying ‘It’s not over till it’s over’? I don’t see buildings falling down or bombs going off or demons crawling out of a giant anus in the sky. We’re still here, and as long as we’re still here, we still have hope, especially when I know what they’re planning.”

  The Inventor looks startled. “You do?”

  “I know enough. I know when and where, and after everything you’ve told me, I think I can guess why. You said that Xal was part of a hive mind, and Nia was the one that connected them all together. Right?”

  “Yes,” the old man says, cautiously.

  “I should have realized,” Cameron says. “It makes sense. Nia always liked the idea of connecting people. Of course she did, it’s what she was made for. I was always trying to explain to her that it’s not what people are made for. But the thing is, she was right. If you forget about the philosophical stuff, free will and self-determination and the importance of solitude and all, human brains are just a collection of interconnected structures, processes, and electronic impulses. Theoretically, we can be hacked—only if you’re Nia, and you have Nia’s abilities, it’s probably more than theoretical.” He taps the screen of his phone and turns it toward the Inventor. “Especially if you’ve got a perfect opportunity to hack a thousand brains at once.”

  The old man squints. “What is this? Some kind of sporting event?”

  “A convention,” Cameron says. “For bio-hacking, here in the city. It’s happening right now, and this is where Nia wants me to go. She said she’s going to bring everyone together, that we’re not going to be alone anymore.” He pauses. “This convention—we’re talking implants, advanced prosthetics, fully immersive sense-based virtual reality systems, performance-enhancing smart drugs. Thousands of people are going to be literally bringing their bodies online. If someone had the skill and tools to connect them . . .”

  The old man nods. “Xal would have her hive.” He frowns. “Or it could be a trap. She is a gifted scientist herself, from a hig
hly advanced race of beings. A human being with your abilities would be of great interest to her.”

  Cameron nods. “You’re right. It’s a risk. But . . . that’s not what it feels like. This feels like Nia. Just Nia. I think she wants me there. Like an audience. Maybe Xal doesn’t even know she invited me.”

  His words hang in the air as silence descends, the quiet of the empty house pressing in around them.

  The empty house.

  Cameron looks around, confused.

  “Wait a minute. Where’s Juaquo?”

  “Oh,” says the old man. “He left quite a while ago. I thought you knew.”

  “He left? Where?” Cameron says, and feels a horrible sinking sensation as the Inventor gives a shrugging reply.

  “I’ve no idea. He didn’t say goodbye, but I heard him muttering on the way out the door. Something about a visit, or a gathering . . .” He trails off, then blinks. “Ah, yes. He was speaking to his mother. Perhaps you should ask her.”

  35

  It All Ends Here

  The I-X Center is buzzing with activity as Cameron pulls into the massive parking lot, scanning the crowd for any sign of his friend. Juaquo isn’t answering messages, and Cameron is afraid he knows why. He has Juaquo’s AR glasses in his pocket now; they were left behind on Cameron’s living room floor, a piece of a puzzle that also includes a sudden surge in online chatter about people across the city exhibiting odd behavior—a different kind of mob from the ones that have been rioting on the coasts, but no less disturbing. In one post, a shaky, grainy video shows a group of five people walking in lockstep down the middle of a street downtown and then suddenly veering, like a single organism, away from an approaching police car. Something strange is happening in this small city on the shores of Lake Erie, and Cameron knows that what happens tonight will only be the beginning. The Inventor has warned him of what’s to come: a global takeover that would bring the world as he knows it to an end, ushering in a new era like something out of a nightmare. A horde of networked humans marching through the streets, demanding cooperation—and forcing it on the ones who refuse. Nia wouldn’t understand; how could she? She sees only the beauty of it, the union of human consciousness, an end to loneliness. She doesn’t realize what it would cost them—what it will cost them, if he can’t convince her to stop.