Ghost in the Machine (Steam and Cyber Series Book 1)

by SJ Davis

  “What do you need from Nico?” she asked Charley.

  “He is a fugitive from Omni.”

  “A fugitive?” asked Caroline. Her voice wisped through the air like perfume. She closed the oversized walnut doors behind her.

  “Well, he doesn’t belong here. I need to get him home.”

  “Nico makes his own decisions. I will see if he is available to you.” Francesca pulled a long golden cord that rang a bell on the lower level. Walking over to a cabinet next, she poured herself a glass of brandy.

  The serving boy returned and walked along the edges of the room not looking up. “Here,” said Francesca. “Thank you for the tea. I want to you to go into the library and retrieve my metal box of vials, the smaller box, please. Then, ask Nico if he is feeling able to receive visitors.”

  “Yes.”

  Nico edged slowly into the room. “Hello, Charley.” Nico’s voice was flat with fatigue.

  “Man, we have to get you back.”

  “You mean forward.”

  “Whatever. You can’t stay here.”

  “But I will stay.” He pushed his strands of twisted hair from his face, over his forehead.

  They all stood, in the moment, and in the silence. The door opened as the serving boy brought Francesca’s box of vials. Nico looked at Charley and shrugged, Charley’s coat slipped to the floor. Small drops of sweat ran down Charley’s forehead as he adjusted his collar.

  “You can’t.”

  “I am. But I have something for you to take back. Think of it as a souvenir of our adventures.” Nico’s voice was gravelly as he grasped a walking cane with both hands. His eyes were still slightly swollen into slits and his face had become gaunt and yellowed. “Just a moment,” he whispered as he left the room.

  “It must be the engine,” said Caroline. “Perhaps we have succeeded after all.” She held Bodhi’s head in her lap. Francesca opened her box of vials, gathering metal measuring spoons and her Bunsen burner. Her hair appeared thicker in the light of the candle sconces, and she even appeared rounder in the middle.

  “Here it is,” announced Nico. Francesca busied herself mixing a tincture as he entered with a large box. “It’s the engine. Take it with you and it should all be done. Roll with the change.”

  “Nico. Let’s go. You have to,” insisted Charley.

  “Come along, Nico. I’m going too,” said Caroline. “I’m fetching Josephine. Take care of Bodhi, Francesca.”

  “He will be fine. It will be a bit of time, but he will be fine,” assured Francesca.

  “I’m not going,” Nico said to Caroline. “But make sure you come back, Caroline.”

  “Please, come with me,” whispered Caroline.

  “No. Not now.” He stroked her hair. “But I will be here waiting for you. Be careful and come home safely.” He kissed the top of her head.

  “What about Anson?” asked Caroline. “He’s still in the airship.”

  “He’s coming with us,” said Charley.

  Francesca grew pale. “Keep him away from Minnow. Don’t let him get anywhere near her.” She rubbed her growing abdomen.

  The Pawn Shop

  January20th 2135

  Yeshua returned to Charley’s with Mexican take-out, a box of Coronas, and the note still shoved in his pocket. Minnow grabbed the chips and guacamole and quickly sat with both items on her lap.

  “I do plan on sharing these chips, you know,” said Minnow. “But, I don’t think Josephine should eat before she has a transfer. We don’t want her to puke if she gets upset.”

  “Nice,” said Yeshua sarcastically. Josephine picked at the chicken quesadillas, prematurely hardening, on the table. Yeshua shoved a lime wedge in the Corona and offered it to Josephine. She glanced over to Minnow who was squeezing her lime against the side of the glass and shoving it down the neck.

  “Push it down,” ordered Minnow. “It’s good, really. And it will help chill you out.”

  “So will many other things that are better,” said Yeshua.

  “Whatever,” said Minnow, drinking in loud gulps. “Get on with things, Charley.” Her lime fell to the bottom of her drained Corona bottle.

  “Right,” said Charley. “We have ourselves an experiment here.” He threw his feet up on his desk, his bulky calves flexed. He wore black rain galoshes that squeaked as his ankles crossed along with frayed camouflage cargo shorts. The office chair reclined halfway to the floor and bounced back up as he stretched to look in the back of his shop. Minnow stabbed a glittery violet long fingernail into her Styrofoam coffee cup, followed by a strange childish smile and laugh. Yeshua looked at her; he shook his head and his eyes narrowed, buried in a sea of eyelashes, the outer corners creasing undetectably.

  “What do you mean by experiment? You do this often enough,” said Yeshua.

  “True. But for entertainment. Not to trick Omni.”

  Josephine stretched out to relieve stiffness in her neck and shoulders. She opened her hand and dropped a smeared from sweat red and black striped pill on the table. She sat back on the couch, leaning over to rest on the arm. Her fist propped up her chin as the strange pill rolled back and forth on Charley’s glass tabletop. She wiped her damp palms on her pants.

  “Eww. My hand is red,” she said, holding them up to show the streaks.

  “You must have the evil taint,” mocked Minnow, licking guacamole from her fingers. “It’s a joke!” she quickly added as Yeshua shook his head. “Maybe you should wear those fancy gloves of yours from now on.”

  From the back, sounds of a guitar, choking out dissonant steely chords, emanated from a newly pawned but barely scuffed Takamine 12-string acoustic-electric guitar.

  “Who’s back there?” asked Yeshua. He could see the guitar but not the player.

  “MadCityJess. She’s here if something goes wrong. She can pull Jo back if we need her to.”

  “I thought she worked in legal?” asked Minnow.

  “She does.” said Charley. “But she’s also the only one with wits enough to hijack a bad transfer. That I know of anyway.”

  “How did I sound?” said Jess, unplugging the guitar.

  “You’re much better as a drummer,” Charley said, his chair dipping low again as he leaned backwards.

  “Shut up,” said Jess. “I’m branching out.”

  She walked out from the back, “Hello again,” she said with a serious flatness as she glanced at each of them, one at a time. “So, this is just a transfer, right?” She carried out a large black bag of trash; the yellow tie at the bag’s top twisted around her fingers. “Or are you doing a memory extraction too?” She threw the trash across the room to the front door. Jess walked around the front of the desk and took a seat on a pile of old plastic milk crates.

  Josephine looked at Yeshua and Charley, shrugging her shoulders. “I don’t know,” she said.

  “What are you after?” asked Jess.

  “I’m hiding from Omni,” Josephine said stammering, her hands picked at a thread on her borrowed jeans, nervous and unable to find the right words. “So, I’m getting a transfer to feed them bad information.”

  “I disagree with the idea,” said Yeshua. “I don’t think she should do it. A memory transfer might do absolutely nothing.”

  “But it might work,” said Jess, pulling out a red wire-framed pair of glasses. From her pocket she grabbed three foil packets and opened them. One packet held small pinkish crystals, another a dusty beige powder, and the last contained a four syringes. She pulled alcohol packets from her back pocket.

  “What are those?” asked Minnow, standing up to get a better look.

  “Anti-psychotics. Just in case. I’ll have them melted down and ready for her when she wakes up.”

  “Do you think she’ll need it?” asked Yeshua.

  “I don’t know. You didn’t,” said Jess. “Remember?” She laid out the syringes, still sealed in sterilized wrap, in a neat row. “But you passed out for three days, and then you rose from the dead. Strange
that your transfer didn’t take.” Jess walked to sink to sterilize her hands and syringes. “But Josephine, frankly, she’s a bit of an ingénue to all of this, and I’d like to be prepared for the worst. Reactions are random.”

  “I remember.” Yeshua rubbed his temples, “Not my fondest memory.” Charley jumped to the back. Metal filing drawers opened and slammed; he walked back out in a leather-trimmed fedora, brim turned up in the front and a blue rubber tourniquet hanging from his arm. “Nice hat,” said Yeshua. Charley smiled, setting the tourniquet on the desk next to Jess’s syringes.

  “Why did you do it?” Josephine asked Yeshua. “I thought you were clean.”

  “I didn’t have a choice. Omni did it. I was a recruit. They search your brain. If Omni picks up anything radical or subversive in your feed, sometimes they try to change your brain. It’s a re-feed. But it didn’t take.”

  Jess hunched forward and pulled out a tube of lipstick. She held up the end of the gold metal tube as a mirror while she recoated her lips a deep shade of crimson. “Scarlet letter,” said Jess, smacking her lips.

  “Did you bring the vials?” asked Charley, uninterested in the makeup.

  “You mean the aspirin, caffeine, and liquid nicotine?” said Jess, rubbing her lips together, blending her lipstick. “Old wives remedy. Does nothing. I’m surprised you’d even ask for it.”

  “Helps with post transfer headache, Jess.”

  Jess shrugged and continued arranging her supplies, “When are we starting?” Josephine stared down at the scratched amber glass of the tabletop, tracing the lines with her finger.

  “What are the mechanics?” asked Josephine. “How does this actually work?"

  “First off, it’s safe,” said Charley. “Done it and seen it done a million times.”

  “But,” said Yeshua, interrupting, “it’s unpredictable.”

  “It’s simple,” said Minnow. “You put on the goggles. You get an IV. We connect a tiny electric diode to your chip, cook down a transfer tablet, and inject you with it. Bing bang boom. Done. You come out with a new brain.”

  “You don’t come out with a new brain. You come out a few new experiences that feel like your own,” said Charley, shooting Minnow a disapproving look. “Listen, Josephine, if you do this, I’ll give you one of mine - that way, if you have any after effects, I can talk you through it.”

  “Talk me through what?”

  “It’s my memory, right? I can talk you through it, if it freaks you out, whatever.”

  “Can’t we just find someone who can remove her chip?” said Minnow. “And then send her on her way?” Minnow looked sideways at Josephine, then picked up a pair of chopsticks and stabbed her already disfigured Styrofoam cup.

  “We’re working on that too,” said Yeshua. “It’s not like they advertise.”

  Josephine leaned forward, carefully. She squinted at the light coming from under the front door. “I don’t know if I should do this. Perhaps it’s too impulsive of an idea.”

  “Exactly. Let’s forget about it,” said Yeshua.

  “No, this really is a good idea,” said MadCityJess. “This could trick Omni and buy us time.”

  Josephine looked over at the dark horizontals of Minnow’s veins; old track marks lied in streaks and spots over her arms. All had healed but several tiny tracks inside her inner arm were hypertrophic. The oldest had whitened away to light pink specks. Minnow stood up, jerked a hoodie from underneath Josephine and yanked it over her head; she pulled the sleeves down past her wrists. Josephine focused her eyes back to Charley. His face was backlit by the computer screen while Jess huddled over his back.

  “I can’t believe you are even thinking of putting pieces of your mind, into Josephine’s,” said Yeshua.

  “Kind of personal, isn’t it?” said Charley with a wink. “Don’t worry, I doubt she’ll fall in love with me afterwards.” Charley tapped the cold surface of his desk and wiped his palms on his shorts. “Come here, Jo. You and I will head to the back. The rest of you can wait out here. You know the routine.”

  Josephine followed Charley and sat on an orange reclining chair covered in yellowed and cracking plastic. Sticking to the chair’s overlay, she propped herself on her elbows to minimize contact.

  “Comfortable?” asked Charley.

  “Um, I don’t know,” said Josephine.

  “What you need to know is that this isn’t about forgetting anything. This is about an insertion of more data. Unfamiliar information to you, but simply extracted data and downloaded into your brain. Simply images and sound, nothing is physical, there is nothing to worry about. Got it?”

  “Yes, of course. Nothing physical. No worries.”

  “Now you and I have to have an agreement.”

  “An agreement?”

  “Yep. Usually memory transfers are between strangers looking for some excitement, anonymous transactions.”

  “I see. I suppose we are in a different set of circumstances.”

  “Yes, and it’s a more of a risk for me than it is for you.”

  “Why?”

  “You must keep whatever memory you acquire completely confidential, or I can be exposed. Can you agree to this?”

  “Yes, of course. I just want to regain normalcy. I want to return to teaching, to having tea, to walking about my garden. Whatever happened in your life, that I might see, is of little concern to me.”

  “Ah, you miss merry old England. But London choked on its own fog…the Industrial Age opened a Pandora’s box.”

  Josephine pushed her hair to the side and laid back. Her neck felt sticky against the chair. Reaching in her pocket, she pulled out a pair of gloves. She hadn’t worn gloves since she arrived, but missed the feeling of security her fingers felt inside them.

  “I want you to relax,” said Charley. He leaned over her and threaded a thin metal wire through the skin behind her ear. “A quick pinch, okay? You won’t feel anything once it’s sub dermal.”

  Josephine looked towards the window as she remembered to breathe; a tea cozy covered a stainless steel teapot between the damask curtains. “You have tea?” she asked with sudden excitement. “Sorry, I miss good tea.”

  “We don’t focus on politeness and manners here, sweet pea. But yep, I brewed some. Yeshua told me it’s your beverage of choice, which would make sense, considering.” She looked around her surroundings, feeling dizzy from the wire, dangling cold and foreign into her scalp. The dimensions of Charley’s back room, his furniture, and rich drapery suggested a Victorian salon except for the worn cracking chair where Josephine sat. In the corner of the room housed a collection of walking canes and parasols, resting against a plaster wall dotted with small dents.

  Charley extracted a large tangerine colored tablet from a small manila envelope with small copper tongs. “You have the red and black pill?” Josephine handed it to him. He put both tablets in a vial of murky liquid over a small Bunsen burner. Charley said nothing while the tablets dissolved; he placed his hands on his thighs and waited. Jess’s voice hissed through a concealed speaker, “You ready?”

  Charley pushed a button behind the curtain, “Almost. I’m still cutting the blend.” The closed circuit monitor of the front area hanging above the window showed Minnow sitting with one leg over the arm of the chair entertaining herself, making Jacob’s ladders with red yarn. Yeshua stood with his arms crossed and his face locked on the front door.

  The entrance door rang and everyone froze. The silhouette of a man in a long coat stood outside the door, hands around a large rectangular box hiding his face.

  “Get rid of him,” said Jess. She kept her headset on, to communicate with Charley.

  Minnow jumped to the side of the door to peek out of the blinds. “It’s Nico!”

  “Open the door,” said Yeshua. “Hurry up.”

  Nico stood unsmiling; his tall frame took up the entire doorway. “Surprise, I’m back.”

  Deregulated Zone of Omni

  November 2134

 
Beyond the neon glare of Omni, the sky was a dull gray. The air felt heavy as the sun set. Filtration masks hung on street corners, along with nebulizers for those having difficulty breathing. Caroline lurched forward and grabbed her skirt.

  “Mercy,” she coughed. “How do people survive here? The air…the dust…”

  “They aren’t surviving. They’re controlled to think they are. But they are all dying.” Charley grabbed Caroline by the elbow as they bent to pick up the slumped Anson.

  “Where are we? What country?” she asked. Her arms trembled nervously as she tried to acclimate and blend in with the strangeness.

  “We’re in the deregulated section of Omni America.”

  Caroline remained silent as she stared at a candle flickering in a restaurant window.

  “You all right?” asked Charley.

  “Don’t we stick out? Not you, perhaps, but look at me!”

  “No. You look just fine here.”

  “What about him?” She pointed to Anson’s limp figure.

  “There won’t be any questions about him. That’s all I’ll say. Anything goes here.”

  Caroline looked around her. A strange woman passed her by, dressed in long robes with golden strands dangling at the sleeves. The woman’s hand reached out to Caroline, her burgundy lacquered finger pointed at her jugular. Next, the skin peeled back from the woman’s hand, smoothly and without evident pain. Caroline swallowed and gasped. The woman laughed and rang bells from around her belt.

  “Illusionist,” Charley said. “She’s a hologram. Fancies herself a street performer.”

  “An illusion?”

  “Some call it human art. A projected statement on the human condition.”

  As they continued down the street, Anson strung like laundry between them, long lines of faint light began to form along the streets. They kept their heads down, eyes to the street. Charley seemed to relax slightly as they approached a small brick building, painted a blinding white. The sun emerged from behind the taller buildings, slow and reddish.