A Lunatic Fear

by B. A. Chepaitis

  Larry finally agreed that it would be good to establish reactivity parameters. They’d tried out a few men before Farley, and it wasn’t pretty. He’d had to call in some big favors to get rid of the bodies.

  They hadn’t planned to test any more men, but when Brendan worked for La Femme, where they were testing various properties of Artemis for their effects on skin regeneration and sexual energy, he was curious about their “secret formula.” With his background in chemistry, he was able to distill one of their lotions to its basis, and then showed up outside Larry’s office with a handful of moonstones he made from it.

  They contained Artemis compounds in their most concentrated form. Even Larry felt their pull, and made Brendan put them in the safe while he called Miriam for advice.

  Miriam suggested they might as well make use of him. “He wants Artemis, let’s give him Artemis,” she said. “We can do some more tests on exposure in men. Besides, I have an idea for how to use him.”

  She took him to her apartment and disappeared for three days. She said she’d made an important discovery. Artemis made men more passive and more aggressive at the same time. More passively aggressive. And since it was so passive, their aggressiveness could be controlled.

  At the time, they were waiting out the end of the Hague moratorium, setting up as they could for what would come next. They had a testing plant going in Connecticut, very illegal but with everyone anticipating a repeal of the ban nobody was putting energy into finding them. They’d also realized by then that getting Planetoid space for an Artemis plant would be a very good thing. Senators wanted the moratorium lifted, but they wanted a litigation-free space for production. Miriam’s idea for securing the deal included Brendan as a key component.

  The moonstones allowed her to control him, she said. She could make him do anything, and she knew exactly what she wanted him to do.

  When she explained, he liked the idea, but he didn’t give trust blindly, especially with a woman like Miriam. Granted, he needed her now, but soon she would become redundant. He already had options for what to do when that happened. In the meantime, he had his own ways of monitoring the situation.

  He smiled at her. “Back to work,” he said.

  She stood. “I know. Me too. I’ll be on the Planetoid for the week.”

  “Taking care of all the glitches, I trust.”

  “There are no glitches. I’ll be overseeing the end game.”

  “Let me know if you need anything.”

  “I will,” she promised.

  As soon as the door closed behind her, he opened his desk drawer, and sought a small piece of paper he kept separate from all his other work. It had a number on it for someone who would be particularly useful in the near future. That someone might be difficult to get hold of, however, so he thought he should start trying now.

  Chapter 6

  Planetoid Three, Zone 12, Toronto City Replica

  The normal houses looked just like what their name said - normal. They were houses anyone would occupy, used for prisoners who needed the security of a stable looking home, prisoners whose programs were stated up front rather than hidden. Unless you knew where to look, you wouldn’t see the click buttons for emergency calls, or for implant overload if your prisoner got out of hand. You’d see only the neat front yards, the wicker chairs on the porches, the white curtains in clean windows.

  Alex walked up to normal house number 2 and pressed the buzzer. Nance was working here with Brendan Farley. Alex had tried calling her yesterday to ask about spending some time with him, but she didn’t answer the call. He’d tried her belt sensor twice and gotten no response on that either. Possibly she was in the thick of things and didn’t want to be interrupted, but Nance usually called back. She wasn’t an empath, and didn’t play games with her prisoners the way Jaguar did. She’d been trained as a psychologist, and most of her moves were good, solid rehab moves.

  He didn’t like to show up unannounced, but he not only needed to see Brendan, he was also getting concerned about her. And if he was interrupting an important moment she’d press the return buzzer to flash a little green light, telling Alex to wait. If not, she’d answer the door.

  He waited.

  Neither event occurred.

  He pressed the buzzer again, and nothing happened.

  “Great,” he muttered. “Just great.”

  He pulled out his code key, which gave him access to all normal house doors, and inserted it in the slot at the side of the door. A click, and the door unlocked. He opened it. Slowly.

  Peered inside the hall that lead to the living room.

  Saw nobody.

  Listened.

  Heard nothing.

  He felt the adrenaline kick in, composed himself, and walked into the house. It was very quiet. He walked through the living room, into the kitchen. A glass of water sat on the kitchen table, next to a set of keys for her wings, and the remains of a sandwich. He touched the crusts of bread. They were still soft. Someone was here very recently.

  He went back through the living room and down the hall, stopping first in the den, where there was no evidence of occupation, and then in the bedroom, where he saw the bed was unmade, uninhabited and - with relief - that it was unbloodied.

  He tried the next bedroom, and found the same. But he heard a sound he couldn’t place at first. Rhythmical. Small and pointed sound.

  A drip. Water dripping, but not onto a hard surface. Water dripping into water.

  He turned toward the bathroom. Walked to the door which was partially closed. Pushed it open.

  The bathtub was full of red water. Red water.

  Red water, and the body of a woman.

  Alex sucked in breath and approached.

  “Nance,” he said. “Oh Jesus. Nance.”

  He knelt down by the side of the tub and observed the great cuts down her arms that released the blood from her veins into the water. He pressed a finger against her carotid, but it was already emptied of all fluids.

  He straightened himself and walked out of the bathroom. He’d have to call this in. Hell and all damnation. Nance wasn’t suicide material. And where was Brendan? He went to her computer to see if she’d kept any notes, but when he got there he paused.

  On the desk in front of the computer was a smooth white stone, small and round. He picked it up, held it to the light.

  Energy still moved strongly within it. And it was an unusual stone. Smooth and tight, as if the molecular structure was more closely bound than other stones. Not igneous. Not quartz, although it had the tight, smooth structure of crystal.

  He made himself relax, let his thoughts run into the small piece of matter he held in his hand. Words flowed from it, back to him, into his hand, immediately and without any need for further probing.

  A man’s voice. A man, walking somewhere.

  Alex closed his eyes and saw the image, clear as if he’d tuned it in on a viewscreen. A tall man with sandy graying hair, glasses, serious expression.

  Brendan Farley. Walking down fourth and main toward - the shuttle station.

  Alex opened his eyes. “Shit,” he said. “The shuttle.”

  But how would he get on? He wouldn’t have a pass, and Nance’s wouldn’t do him any good.

  No time to sit around and think about it. He’d walked, but he could use Nancy’s wings. He grabbed the keys from the kitchen table, left the house, got in and pointed them toward the shuttle station.

  The first task was to secure the prisoner. Once he did so, he’d call it all in. If Farley got away, he’d have a different kind of report to make: One teacher dead, one prisoner escaped.

  When he landed and entered the station, he immediately saw Farley standing in front of the arrival and departure sign, peering up at it. Alex quieted himself, strolled over and stood near, peering up as well.

  “What are you looking for?” he asked.

  “New England corridor,” Brendan replied. “At least, I think –“ He frowned, dug into his pock
et, took out a piece of paper and chewed at his lip while he read. “Yes. Connecticut. New England corridor.”

  “Visiting family?” Alex asked.

  “No. It’s what the Mother told me to do.”

  He turned and showed Alex his full face. “I suppose you know who I am,” he said.

  Alex jerked his head back, then tried to cover the gesture unsuccessfully. He was surprised, and Brendan knew it.

  Okay, he thought. We’ll play it that way.

  “That’s right,” he said amicably. “I do.”

  “You’re here to take me back, aren’t you?”

  “Maybe,” Alex said, “I just want to talk.”

  Brendan closed his eyes, and a smile flickered across his face. “I doubt it,” he said. “But I’ll answer any questions you have.”

  “Did you kill Nance?” Alex asked.

  He shook his head, kept his eyes closed. “She killed herself.”

  “You convince her that was a good idea?”

  “No need to. It is a good idea.”

  “I’m guessing,” Alex suggested, “all those people who died in the mall wouldn’t agree.”

  “They’d agree,” Brendan replied, “if they knew the truth.”

  “What’s that?”

  He opened his nondescript eyes and turned them on Alex.

  Cold. There was deep cold in his eyes. The empty spaces like the dark at the back of the closet. The swirling eddies of sorrow, creeping despair, afternoons alone and nights without comfort of body or soul. He found himself swimming in the death of animals, the death of plants, the death of all bodies with no hope of regeneration. Cells drying and lifeless. Toxins creeping in where life once resided.

  Jesus, he thought. That’s no good.

  He hadn’t made empathic contact. Why should he be feeling so much? It was out of hand already. Too much. Too big and too close. Somewhere he heard Jaguar’s voice, telling him to be careful.

  Don’t fuck around with this stuff. It will eat you alive.

  And how to avoid being fucked around with?

  Good boundaries. You know.

  Boundaries. He found the space at the center of his chest and pushed them out from his inside. Boundaries. His head cleared, and his emotional space lightened. Better. That was better.

  “Maybe you’re right,” he replied casually, when he could find his voice. Best to keep talking. Don’t let him do that again. “Where’d you get the money for it?” he asked.

  Brendan blinked, and seemed a little surprised. Not the reaction he was used to, Alex supposed.

  “A job I did.”

  “Must’ve been quite a job. You used a lot of expensive material.”

  “Just a delivery job. I deliver things sometimes. Take orders. I’m a messenger boy.”

  “For anyone in particular?”

  His head moved up and down, up and down, as if keeping time to an internal music. After due consideration, he said simply, “I work for The Mother.”

  Alex waited for more. It didn’t come.

  “She told you to dump pesticides at the Mall?”

  Brendan paused again as if listening, then spoke. “She’s been eating them for years. Isn’t it about time we got a taste of what we make her swallow?”

  “It’s only fair,” Alex agreed.

  “Yes,” Brendan said. “Besides, humans are a virus. What I did slows the spread of the disease.”

  “I see,” Alex said. “So what’ll you do now?”

  He shrugged. “Connecticut. Two tickets.”

  “Two tickets?”

  “Yes. Of course. One for me and one for you. For tomorrow. You buy them.” He indicated a ticket stand to his left. “I don’t have any money right now. I’ll wait here.”

  Okay, Alex thought. Okay.

  He got in line, and took the opportunity to get out his cellcom. Jaguar would be deep in with the women, so he decided to call Paul first, let him know about Nance and Brendan. He wasn’t in, but Alex left a message, asked him to pass it on to Jaguar. As he spoke, he saw Brendan waiting patiently, peering around as if he wasn’t quite sure where or who he was.

  Alex purchased the tickets and went back to him, handed them over. Brendan took them and stared at them as if he was trying to remember what they were.

  “Are you all right?” Alex asked.

  Brendan continued to stare at the tickets. “I think – there’s something. I – can’t quite remember.”

  He raised his eyes to Alex, and a profound, unguarded sorrow showed in his face. It was the sorrow of a child who doesn’t understand why he’s being beaten, what he’s done to deserve the beating. Alex had to resist the urge to comfort him.

  Brendan shivered, squared his shoulders, and started walking fast, making his way toward the exit. Alex stared for a moment, then trotted to catch up.

  “Hey,” he said when he was at Brendan’s side, “What’s the idea? I thought I was going with you.”

  He blinked at him as if he’d forgotten about him entirely, and Alex imagined that he had. “Sorry,” he said. “I - didn’t think.”

  “What’s up?” Alex asked.

  “The Mother. She’s - disturbed. Angry with me.”

  Now that was interesting, Alex thought. He didn’t test positive for psychosis, but he was obviously hearing something. A variant form of telepathy, perhaps. Alex has seen that. Once he had a prisoner who almost constantly picked up on the thoughts of dementia patients. He had only to learn how to block them, and he’d been fine.

  He hoped whoever or whatever Brendan heard wasn’t about to order him back on the shuttle. Alex wanted to keep him here, develop some trust, then put him in a room with Karena and Jaguar.

  “What does she want?” he asked.

  “We have a schedule to keep. I – forgot.” His face expressed torment, and he balled his hands into fists and punched them into his legs. “Stupid,” he said, hitting himself, “Stupid stupid stupid.”

  Alex reached down and grabbed his wrist, stopping his hand. “Listen,” he said, “tell me what you have to do and I’ll make sure you don’t forget.”

  Brendan regarded him suspiciously. “What?”

  “I’ll help you remember,” Alex repeated.

  Brendan was still for a moment, then he unbunched his hands and relaxed his arms. “We should go,” he said.

  “Go – where? Connecticut?”

  “No. The eco-site. The rainforest eco-site.” He made a clucking sound of disapproval. “Though why you make them here when we can’t take care of them on the home planet is beyond me.”

  “I think we have a different attitude about that sort of thing on the Planetoid,” Alex noted. “Why do you want to go there?”

  “It’s near the works.”

  “The – works?”

  “Energy, water supply, so on.”

  “That’s important?”

  “Of course.”

  “Why?”

  Brendan put his head back and peered up at the ceiling. “I’ll tell you later,” he said. “You’ll need this.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a smooth white stone. He held it out and Alex took it.

  It was like the one in Nance’s house, and it felt cool and good in his hand, just the right weight for holding, just the right texture for smoothing between palm and thumb. He smoothed it.

  As he did, a feeling of deep calm enveloped him. Clarity and coolness all around him. The stone seemed to pull him into his own hand, as if he could invert, slowly and softly, and become part of this compressed matter. As if that inversion would give him all the answers he sought.

  He was going with Brendan, to save him. To save the Planetoid and the moon. Wasn’t that his life? Saving the unsaveable. Saving those who didn’t even know they needed it. Hadn’t he saved Jaguar years ago, when she first came to his office looking for work on the Planetoid? Hadn’t he saved her from getting killed again and again?

  Of course, she wasn’t grateful, but he didn’t expect gratitude. It was just wh
at he did, saving people. And he could save Brendan as well.

  He smiled and looked up. Saw that Brendan was smiling back.

  “Let’s go,” Brendan said, and they did.

  Chapter 7

  In the morning Jaguar was woken by the sound of someone whispering in her ear. She rolled over in her sleeping bag and mumbled something rude back at the voice. It continued to whisper, in mildly disapproving tones, “Message for Dr. Addams. Immediate retrieval requested. Message for Dr. Addams. Immediate retrieval requested.”

  “Fuck me,” Jaguar groaned, and felt around on the ground near her head for her belt sensor. Why she promised Alex she’d take it, why she kept her promise, and why she didn’t remember to turn it off were all questions she couldn’t answer.

  Her hand touched plastic and she dragged it through the dirt to her face, pressed the retrieval button and listened with her eyes closed.

  “Jaguar,” Rachel’s voice said. “Can you come in to Alex’s office? I need to talk to you. I mean, I really need to talk to you.”

  “Xipe Totec,” Jaguar muttered.

  She sat up and rubbed at her face. Rachel, notoriously understated, could be bleeding to death, or have a gun to her head. Jaguar looked at the three women who slept around her, breathing lightly, eyes closed. If they tried to run, their implants would stop them before they reached the edge of the eco-site. And if she hurried, she could be downtown in an hour, back in another. Of course, that wouldn’t account for everything that might come in between, but she’d have to chance it.

  She pulled herself out of her sleeping bag and padded on bare feet over to Fiore, leaned down and touched her shoulder. Her eyes opened immediately, as if she’d been waiting for Jaguar to wake her.

  “I have to leave you alone for awhile. A few hours. I’m putting you in charge.”

  Fiore’s head jerked up and down. Jaguar took this as agreement. “Don’t do anything stupid,” she said. “If you try to leave the site, you’ll be stopped. Got it?”