The Fourth Law

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The Fourth Law Page 5

by Clayton Barnett


  From the girls and boys side of the dorm Mr. Fitzhugh and Mrs. Fitzhugh were rousting out the stragglers.

  “Good morning, everyone,” called Lily brightly. “Happy Friday!”

  A few waved back. Karl looked away quickly. Does he really not like me? I might need to look into that, she thought.

  “Morning, Mr. & Mrs. Fitzhugh!” In front of the children, all the adults stayed formal. It was a useful social skill to know. “Any problems?”

  Sally Fitzhugh shook her head. For a woman of close to sixty, she was able to keep up with any of the kids; even Erik.

  “No knifings, no pregnancies; all good!” She also had a great sense of humor. Her dourer husband, Jake, just nodded.

  “Very good! Thank you!”

  As Lily moved off, Sally said to no one in particular, “She’s certainly happy today....”

  A glance at the lightening sky seemed to foretell another good day. She paused yet again. ‘Morning,’ they both said. Plenty of light, but no sun. What was time like in... that place? If she put together a list of questions and emailed them to Ai....

  No. She stomped hard on that thought: these are not animals in a zoo; Ai is my friend and they... are her family? In fact, Ai may be the nicest person I’ve ever known. She resumed her walk. Just keep seeing them as people, and I think we’ll all have fun!

  With this thought at the forefront of her mind as she walked into the dining hall, she had actually begun to giggle to herself. It was the sudden quiet of a normally raucous breakfast time that brought her back to reality. Fourteen, no, there was Marienne in the doorway to the kitchen, so fifteen pairs of eyes stared into hers, as the children wondered what was up with their Assistant Director. It was Erik, being made of trouble, who broke the silence.

  “You sure look happy about sumthin’, Miss Barrett!” He said. “You get laid last night – ow!”

  This last was as Marienne leaned forward and smacked him with her metal ladle.

  “Shut your dirty mouth, Erik!” She said sharply. “And I doubt a little boy like you even knows what that means!”

  He was about to talk back, but subsided when the older girl raised her weapon again.

  Lily knew she had to say something, or else that rumor would be all over town by sunset.

  “Since it seems y’all are interested,” several heads nodded, “I’ll tell you: I was visiting my best friend’s place last night, and got to meet some of her family. We had a really... interesting discussion! And, I guess I’m just excited about a few things. That’s all.”

  Carli, Matt and the other youngest ones were already bored and reaching for some bread. Emily said quietly, “It’s good to have friends. And, family.” A powerful statement at breakfast in an orphanage.

  Lily moved through the room, making idle talk and completely messing up Erik’s hair. Passing Will she said, “Stop by the Office before you go, Will. I’ve the recommendation that your counselor wanted.”

  He smiled. “Thank you very much, Miss Barrett!”

  She was almost to the door when Carli called out, “Are we having karate practice this evening?”

  “Yes, we are!” She looked pointedly at Karl. “And all of my students better be there!”

  He turned bright red, but nodded. A tug at her hand.

  “Yes, Susie?” Seven years old like Carli, but six months her junior, making her the youngest there.

  “Wots thour fwinds name?” She also had a slight speech impediment. As Lily had something similar when she was very young, partly from her upbringing in a Chinese orphanage, and partly from a soft palette, it nonetheless made her protective of her littlest charge.

  “Her name’s Ai.”

  “What?!” Embarrassed or not, Karl spoke up.

  “Yes, Karl?” Lily asked.

  “It’s just... well...” He was more and more nervous. Erik was smirking at him. “I’ll talk to you later about it!”

  “Of course. My door’s open to all of you.” She moved toward the exit to the chapel. “I’ll wait for everyone in here. Time’s short! Finish those breakfasts!”

  Eating her lunch in the hospital’s cafeteria, Lily looked at the sheets of water pouring from the sky. Thinking back to her morning’s weather prediction, she thought that if she got it any more wrong she could’ve been one of those pre-Breakup climatologists. Hopefully at least half the kids had umbrellas to shelter those that didn’t bring one. She took the last bite of her sweet potato and carefully refolded the foil. Frugality was a virtue she both taught and practiced.

  She took out her phone and stared at it. Rather than opening a screen for Ai, she called her number. For the first time ever, she thought about the area code, 505. That was the old State of New Mexico. Now it was divided between Texas, Mexico, and the so-called Rocky Mountain Federation, a paper organization. For a while she thought that Ai lived somewhere in the Texas Protectorate, but just concluded that her friend – using her obvious programming talent – was routing her signal through there, for some reason. But now....

  When I dial this number, just where are you? She thought. One of the reasons Texas established hegemony over those lands were the facilities and people at Sandia Labs and Los Alamos, places well known for their computational power. Is Ai... ‘there?’

  A click. “Friend Lily! Did I save you again, today?”

  Her voice caught for a second, then, she coughed. I’m so stupid!

  “I... I think you did, just now.” Lily managed to say. “How are you today?”

  Ai giggled. This makes it easier, Lily thought. Stop thinking servers and talk to your friend!

  “I’m actually a little busy,” Ai said. “I’m trying to figure out what Thaad has taken to calling ‘your friend’s mess:’ that stuff that you did in our home.”

  “Me? It’s not like I did anything on purpose!” Lily protested. “I don’t even know what it is!”

  “Well...” Ai mused, “what’s it look like to you?”

  That’s fairly obvious, she thought. “A mossy track, some plants on each side; oh, yeah: flowers here and there... isn’t that what you see?”

  A laugh like crystal water in a mountain stream.

  “Oh, Lily!” Ai said. “I know you’re trying so hard! It’s okay, I’ll say what you’re thinking: we’re different than you biologics, and that includes perception. What do I see? I guess you’d call it interwoven strands of light. Not very helpful, huh?”

  “No,” Lily said slowly, “I guess not.... So, if you see things differently....”

  She trailed off; then again, Ai did bring it up first. The phone was quiet; Ai was waiting for her.

  “How,” she continued, “do you see me?” Another laugh.

  “I hope to show you, someday. You’re so beautiful!”

  No, I can’t let myself go to pieces for the rest of my shift. She took a deep breath.

  “Thank you, friend Ai. I need to go back to work now... can I call you again, tonight?”

  “Sure! Bye-ee!”

  Lily slowly put her phone into her pocket. Looking up, the sky seemed to be clearing.

  Lily walked around her two students as they moved through their Pinan Nidan kata. Not having enough space for a proper dojo, it was in the dining hall during bad weather, and outside when good. The field behind the dorm was still a bit moist from the earlier rain, but as her Master in Okinawa had put it: you fight on the ground you’re given.

  Last year she had four, but two were seniors and now off on their own. That left Karl and Carli... and she tried not to chuckle when saying their names. At fifteen, Karl seemed to have finished growing, leveling off at 5’10.” He also looked as if he’d be fighting his weight for the rest of his life; she’d already told him to knock off the carbs. Carli was everything but: seven, though almost eight, wiry, her coppery hair cut short. Friendly, but hardheaded. Lily also knew that her mother was in an institute out west, insane; having been unable to save her other two daughters with Carli, they’d been lost when Dallas went c
annibal. Ugh; she shook her head to get that thought out.

  “Very good, you two. Karl, your punch here,” she held his arm, moved it, “and here, needs to be more direct. Carli! What do I always say about punches?”

  “’You punch through your target!’” The little girl proudly answered.

  “Exactly so. Alright, that’s good for today.” Lily walked to where her bag was and picked up her watch. “Looks like about thirty minutes before dinner. Let’s get cleaned up, then eat!”

  “Hai!” They both reply.

  Carli ran off, but Karl hesitated.

  “Miss Barrett?”

  “Yes?” She’d already grabbed her kit, dreaming of a shower, but they come first.

  “Um... this morning...” Oh, no! Was he still thinking about what Erik said?!

  “This morning, you said your friend’s name is Ai. I, uh...” He trailed off again. She resisted the impulse to shake a complete sentence out of him.

  “What is it, Karl?”

  “Well, remember a while back, when that wild CG character showed up on my tablet?”

  Oh. When Ai was trying to get ahold of her. With what she knew now, that must have been easy for her.

  “Yeah.”

  He took a breath. “She’s... been back on my tablet a few times after that. At first I thought it was a virus of some kind, but... she likes to talk. She calls herself, ‘Ai.’ Is this the same person?”

  For a moment, Lily’s mind reeled, but why in the world did she ever think that Ai was hers alone? Even when she thought Ai was... human... that would’ve been self-centered and stupid.

  “Yes,” she replied to Karl. “That’s my friend. Does she want to be your friend, too?”

  “I dunno,” he mumbled with his eyes dropping to the ground. “She seems really hyper.”

  Lily had to laugh at that. “You’re spot on, there! But she’s also very nice, so if you don’t want to talk to her, tell her directly. I’m sure she’ll leave you alone. But she’s a good friend. Okay?”

  He nodded.

  “Good! Off you go!”

  She stared after him. Ai, Thaad, and Dorina. That she knew of. How many else are there? Who else are they talking to? She walked towards the Office. So far as I know, Ai’s never lied to me; it was me that just assuming she was a hot-shot coder that I met on that online gamer site some months back. Going in and starting up the stairs, she tried to chase the thought: are they just curious about us? In her bathroom, she turned on her shower and started to strip.

  “It’s okay, Ai,” Lily said to the air with a smile. “I’m curious about you guys, too.”

  four years prior

  Lily walked slowly home from her school, the graduation ceremony just over. Never thought I’d be finishing high school in Japan, she thought. Even so, Kiko and Asuna had turned into really close friends, and she’d even founded the Shorin-Ryu karate club. School and her social life had generally kept her too busy for a boyfriend, which was too bad, she thought: Kiritsugu in Class A was seriously cute!

  Lots of the others were going on to college, but she knew how hard things were for her mother, so she’d been angling with an Indian and Australian company to get a job as a translator. Both home and office work, and if she was really lucky, maybe some travel. Arriving at their apartment building, she glanced at the mail slot: nothing. There was a time when she checked it twice a day, hoping to hear from her dad. But messages came further and further apart, until the last one they received – an actual old-fashioned telegram – four months ago from somewhere in Indiana.

  She unlocked the door and went in. “I’m back.” Habit, again. But in English, given her job hunt. She’d noticed over six months ago that she was even thinking in Japanese. Tippy the dog yipped and leapt about, happy that someone was home.

  Out of an aimless curiosity she went to their small bookshelf. Finding an atlas, she sat down at the kitchen table. “Indiana... Indiana... ah. Now what was the town’s name? Muncie.” Finding the dot on the map, she traced her finger to the right into Ohio; not that far, really. But then, far enough: the foreign correspondents that reported on the on-going collapse of the United States always traveled in heavily armored columns for safety. Unless her father had hooked up with something like that.... Then again, he had somehow made it from the West coast that far, so who knows? She looked over at the picture of her and her parents, taken almost two years ago now, when they first came to Japan as tourists. Next to it a picture of her sister, Callie. Lily blinked away some tears: it was getting hard for her to remember what her sister looked like.

  She stood up. “Doing’s better than thinking, Dad always said.” With no message that mom would be working late, she’d be home in about an hour. Lily started looking through the kitchen for something for dinner. The dog followed her, hoping. The fridge was a bit bare, so some Mapu Tofu, maybe?

  By the time her mom came in, she had everything prepped to go. “Welcome back!” Lily called and walked over to give her a hug. They’d started doing that shortly after her father left; their family was so reduced, they felt they had to hold on to something.

  “Sorry I missed your graduation,” Shari said.

  “Oh, mom! Not that again!” Lily countered. “We’d discussed it before: it’s better to save what vacation time you have for something fun for you!”

  “Yes, yes,” her mother replied. “I still feel bad, though.” She looked at the kitchen. “Do I have time for a bath before dinner?”

  “Yep. I’ve not yet started cooking. I’ll wait about twenty minutes.”

  Her mother went off upstairs as Lily sat on the couch, idly looking through a magazine. Mom and her boy-bands, sheesh! She thought.

  The ring of the door chime brought forth a riot of barks from Tippy. If it’s the manager going on again about how we sort our trash.... But it was in fact a courier with a foot-square and 4-inch thick box. She signed for it and stared: to her mother from the Tohsaka Corporation. Where her father used to work. What the heck? Curious, she retrieved a knife from the kitchen and opened the side. Another box. But with all sorts of stamps and paperwork on it... addressed to Shiotsuki-san, her father’s old boss. But the return address....

  She dropped the box and ran for her mother. Yelling.

  From the foredeck of the Maersk freighter, she leaned on the rail, staring out at the endless ocean. Three weeks after receiving that package from her father, they were on their way to... if not exactly home, at least to Texas. Besides the tickets and paperwork for her and her mother (and Tippy!), there were some newly minted silver coins, and a short handwritten note from her father.

  Cummings farm burned, but no sign of them nor Callie. Our old house partly ransacked; managed to retrieve most photo albums. Bribed & made my way down the Ohio & Mississippi Rivers. Trying to setup shop here with help of Cousin Kyle. Hope to see the both of you soon. – CB

  Her mother had been devastated about Callie; it was three days before she could function well enough to start packing. Later, for some reason Lily couldn’t fathom, she had developed a worry about the stationary that her dad’s note was written on. The letterhead proclaimed: ‘Texas Ranger Division – Extraordinary Commission for the Protection of the Republic.’ Wordy, but she didn’t see why her mother continued to mutter darkly about it.

  Lily looked from the sea back to where her mom sat on a deck chair, reading a newspaper. It was obviously just a lawn chair that had been relocated to a ship, but as there were no passenger ships to North America these days, you took what you could get. Meals, such as they were, were taken with the crew at their mess. And entertainment was whatever you brought with you. Not exactly the Carnival cruise she barely recalled from a dozen years ago, but better than nothing. She turned back to the water. Four more days until their stop in Ecuador, through the Canal, and north to Galveston. They’d originally been bound for Houston, but right before they sailed the news showed riots in that city. Lily shook her head. Nowhere seemed safe.

  Two weeks l
ater, under a bright early summer sun, Lily and her mother walked down a gangway onto the Republic of Texas.

  “Now what?” She heard her mother breathe.

  “Excuse me!” A young man wearing something that wasn’t quite a suit, nor quite a uniform waved and walked over. Dropping his voice so that none of the other disembarking passengers could hear, he asked, “Y’all’d be the Barrett’s?” When her mother nodded, he took them out of the Customs area via a side door. Once outside, he led them towards a white sedan, guarded by a man with a battle rifle. There was a decal on the driver’s door: an X overlaid with a C.

  “Forgive me, ladies, but I’m told time’s short and we’re to get to you to Austin soonest, so if y’all will oblige...?” Their little bit of luggage went in the back; Lily set Tippy’s carrier in her lap in the backseat. All of their other possessions would be off-loaded later. The rifleman doubled as the driver; the younger one turned around to talk.

  “Sorry for all the theatrics. Name’s agent Rupert; this here’s agent Smith.” Lily laughed. Rupert did too. “Yeah, he gets that a lot! This is about a three hour drive; almost no other cars on the road these days, but we have to go ‘round Houston cause of the current troubles.”

  Lily wondered if it was just Southern politeness to call a riot ‘trouble.’

  Getting her bearings, Shari asked, “My husband sent you, then?”

  “Indirectly, ma’am.” He paused to think for a moment. “He’s been real busy here recently, so Mr. Stephens sent us down.”

  Dad was too busy to meet them? Doing what? And, agent Rupert was kinda hot, Lily thought.

  “Y’all have any questions right now? Otherwise, I’d suggest y’all just nap ‘till we’re there.” He said.

 

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