by A. L. Davroe
Persevere.
Almost as quickly as I can read it, it disappears, blasting apart in a thousand different directions only to slingshot back inward, as if drawn by some magnetic force. The threads come at me. Go through me. The first through my hand. Another through my hip. And then my shoulder and my chest, and then so many that I can’t tell where they are coming from or where they are going. It’s like being attacked by millions of long needles. There’s so much pain, but I don’t cry out. It’s too quick. I can only draw a breath of utter surprise.
And then it’s over.
Fingers numb and shaking, I reach up and pull off the blinders.
“Is it done?” Uncle Simon asks, his voice anxious and his eyes bright with excitement.
Swallowing hard, I nod my head. “Y-Yeah, I think so.”
“Well played.”
Well played. I’ve planted a virus in the Main Frame—planted seeds of hope. What will the Aristocrats do after this little hiccup? What change will come? I’ll have to be there to help. Which means that it’s time for this spider to descend from her secluded hiding spot. “A-Am I free now? C-Can I have my legs?”
Uncle Simon smiles, warm and bright. “Of course you can. You deserve them.”
I exhale a nervous laugh. “Thank you.” Tears start falling unbidden from my eyes. I can’t tell if they are tears of joy or terror of what’s to come. I have a whole life ahead of me. A life where I will be unapologetically me and, hopefully, make change. Meems comes over and lifts me from the chair.
I cry silently as she carries me to the bed and pulls my modified half pants off, revealing my stumps. I continue crying as Uncle Simon opens up a medical bag and begins attaching my new legs. When he uses the numbing spray, it stings a little, but then I can’t feel anything as he and Meems work to attach the leg to my stump, mending together nerves, muscles, bone, tendon, and flesh with synthetics.
I stand in the bathroom and stare at myself in the mirror. Now that I can stand, albeit a little uncertainly, I can finally see my face. I look older than the Ellani of my memories. My hair is longer, my cheekbones more prominent, my expression more somber and reserved. I look, more than ever, like my mother; the only thing separating my face from hers is the scar on my forehead.
I try to measure the time that has passed since I last thought about a birthday. It had been in the pod the night of the accident. I’d wanted a Mod for my upcoming birthday. I got a Mod. One that changed my entire life. And now, this face will go, too. I’ll have to Modify myself and be someone new. In order to survive. Still, I just managed to learn to love this face, to appreciate the features my mother gave to me, to function without being Modified… And now, it’s being forced on me. It seems so cruel. But I need to live.
“Tasha, what’s today?”
“July 3rd of the year 232.”
I blink at myself. I’ll be eighteen in a few days. No wonder I look older and more reserved. I’ve been shut up in here for a whole year.
Uncle Simon comes to stand in the doorway. He stares at me, arms crossed. I’m painfully aware of the fact that I haven’t yet put any pants on. I feel a little awkward, but his eyes are on my face, and he doesn’t seem to notice my indecency; his mind is somewhere else.
“How do they fit?”
I shift my weight back and forth. My stumps feel tender, but the prosthetics are well fitted and padded. “I’m surprised I can stand so easily.”
He nods. “With the amount of sitting up you do, your abdominal muscles are strong. The circuitry attached to the legs keeps them wired directly into your neural interface, so they should react with the same speed and precision of true appendages. You’ll just have to worry about slight atrophy of the gluteal and thigh muscles, so don’t do too much bending over or squatting until you’ve gotten them toned again.”
I nod. “I’m not too worried about that. Meems made sure I exercised.”
Uncle Simon smiles to himself. “I always kept Meems abreast of my plans for you. She knew that I wanted to eventually restore you as a citizen and give you back your whole body. So she must have been preparing you.”
I reach down and touch the synthetic skin encasing the cybernetic leg. The only thing to indicate that the leg is not truly flesh is the band where it attaches to my leg. It’s even warm, made more human by micro circuitry that heats the silicone inside. “Thank you,” I say quietly. It feels like I shouldn’t be saying such a thing to him, that he took my life away from me and I shouldn’t thank him for finally giving it back. But, at the same time, if he hadn’t done all this to me, I wouldn’t be the girl standing in front of this mirror. In fact, I’d most likely be dead. So really, I can’t hate him, can I?
“You’ve earned it. You must think I’m a cad, letting your parents train you like they did and then keeping you here and striking that bargain with you, but I truly believe in what they were working for.”
I stare at myself again. “I think I want the same thing. Maybe even more. So, that doesn’t make me a tool, does it?” I turn back to him with a smile. “And our deal was equally beneficial, right?”
He nods.
I turn away again. “Fulfilling their dream is only a stepping stone to my own dream.” I smile at myself. “There’s a lot to look forward to. A whole future filled with possibility.”
Meems appears behind Uncle Simon with a large garment bag in her hand. I lift a brow. “What’s that?”
“It’s your birthday present,” Uncle Simon says.
I slip past him and watch as Meems lays the bag on the bed and opens it. Inside is a vibrant red dress. Meems lifts it and turns it one way and then the other, letting the light glitter off the nano-fabric that looks so soft and vivid it might be liquid fire. It reminds me of the firebird that Dad became in the Anansi Chamber.
I look to Uncle Simon. “What’s that for?”
He grins. “You can’t go to a ball in your underwear, Ellani. Even your mother wasn’t that rebellious.”
“A ball?”
“G-Corp is holding a ball tonight.”
I swallow hard. “And you mean for me to go?”
He nods.
“But now that I’ve planted the virus, won’t they come after me? Kill me, too?”
Uncle Simon looks serious. “It’s a possibility. If they can trace it back to you.”
I reach out and touch the dress, certain that this has to be a dream—or a nightmare. I can’t decide which. The dress feels like water slipping between my fingers. Whatever kind of fabric it is, it must be a brand-new development of the textiles department. I should be happy. I have legs, I can be free, and I can find Guster. But my nerves are all in a twist, and I’m suddenly terrified of again trying to become one with the world that shunned me. “So, if they want me dead, why am I going to their ball?”
Uncle Simon bows low. “Your prince awaits. I did promise.”
Excitement punches me in the stomach, making me feel giddily nauseous. “He’s going to be there?”
“I guarantee it.”
Remembering Gus is an Elite in Real World, I frown. I probably don’t have a chance at all with him. Even if I am technically as rich as they are, his social circle wouldn’t approve of him being with a Natural—because, even if I change my face, I won’t look like the Aristocrats. I refuse. But he did say that he wanted to be with me here, and he did come looking for me. And after tonight, the world will change—technology will be shunned, and that which is natural will become beautiful again. “Does he know I’m coming?”
“Doubt it.”
I try to even out my suddenly ecstatic breathing. “But I’m supposed to be dead. Won’t that arouse suspicion?”
Uncle Simon grins as he reaches into the side pocket of his doublet and pulls out a familiar headband. It has been repaired since the last time I saw it.
I gasp. “My holo-mask.”
>
He holds it out to me. “I assume you see what I have in mind?”
Chapter Forty-two
Post-American Date: 7/3/232
Longitudinal Timestamp: 8:00 p.m.
Location: Dome 5: Evanescence
The pod skims to a halt outside of the Bella Adona, the massive main building of the Cyr estate. It’s a boxy golden building that towers above every other structure in Evanescence and houses the whole of G-Corp conglomerate’s most prized possessions, including the Cyr family and G-System’s main terminal.
I stare at the leviathan that makes up the heart of our city. It reminds me of the massive building in the middle of Central Dominion. “Here?” I say with a shiver. “Why?”
“It’s Master Quentin’s birthday today, and the ball is being held in his honor,” Uncle Simon reflects. “It was his decision to have the party here.”
I scrunch my nose. In some not-so-distant past, the old Ella would have been tickled pink at the idea of stepping into Quentin’s home, but thoughts of him don’t stir anything inside anymore. I take note of the hundreds of security droids stationed along the building’s perimeter, looking like frightening gunmetal-gray gargoyles frozen against the delicate lawns and gardens that the holo-screens project around the building.
I follow Uncle Simon as he gets out of the pod. “Simon Drexel, plus one.”
We wait as the android usher checks the list and then scans each of us in turn. As the scan of my chip doesn’t prompt any kind of alert, I let out a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. The false identification I programmed over my own is holding true.
Uncle Simon offers me his arm, and we follow the android escort down the red carpet and through the nano-glass doors of Bella Adona. He leads us through a richly appointed main hall, empty save the security droids and the aerovators, but still managing to speak volumes of its richness through simple grandiosity and the materials that were used to build it. White marble covers the floor. The columns and walls are covered in rich carvings, scrollwork, and gold leafing. There are marble statues stationed at either side of the aerovator, their classic, full-bodied subjects looking just as out of place here as I feel.
The aerovator shoots upward and pings to a halt on the topmost floor. As the doors slide open they reveal a penthouse encased in nano-glass. The inside of the Cyr mansion is just as opulent and beautiful as the main foyer downstairs, except here there is antique furniture and pieces of lost and forgotten artwork from ages past displayed in suspension chambers.
Everywhere, set among the lost relics of humanity, are the Aristocrats. They, themselves like their own pieces of artwork—designed to complement the creativity of their ancestors. Swallowing, I tighten my grasp on my uncle’s arm.
“What if someone recognizes me?” I whisper.
He pats my hand reassuringly. “Trust me, they won’t. Not with that ingenious little device you’ve invented for yourself. Even if they did, what could they do? The virus has already been planted and is working as we speak. At eleven o’clock, we’ll have a complete blackout, and they will have more on their hands than a dead girl who snuck into a ball.”
I nod, giddy with excitement at the prospect of all of Evanescence deciding to reevaluate its way of life.
As we’re announced—my uncle under his proper name and me under the name I put on my chip earlier, Charlotte Webb—I scan the crowd.
“Charlotte Webb?” Uncle Simon asks.
I smirk, my eyes still searching. “She’s a literary character. Another spider.”
He nods to himself. “I like it. It wouldn’t be right to take Anansi, would it? That was your mother’s code name. You, little spider, should have your own code name.”
I turn my head and blink, sheepish. “I’m sorry, what?”
He scrunches his brow, annoyed that I’m not paying attention. “Who are you looking for?”
I lower my head, a little ashamed that I’m being so obvious. “Delia.”
He frowns. “Avoid her if you see her.”
“Why?” But I don’t need his explanation. Her laugh, that lovely falsity that is the Modification, cuts through the crowd, stirring memories both treasured and painful.
My eyes find her the next moment. She’s changed. Everything about her has changed. Her hair is different. It’s blue and spiky with white tips, her eyes are the same shade of blue, the pupil a narrow black slit, and her eyebrows short slots on the edge of a forehead that has been implanted to look more bulbous, the skin around it dotted with bright yellow and jet black. Her cheeks and the bones over her temple are more angular. She still looks like a bird, though which one, I don’t know.
“Oh circuits,” I breathe, my heart sinking. “What did she do?”
Uncle Simon shakes his head, his face sad.
Frowning, I watch Delia. She says something, and the girl beside her laughs and kisses her in the same friendly manner that I once did. In the manner of best friends. As Delia’s new friend turns, I catch my breath. She and Delia have matching Modifications, something that’s common for close female friends in the Aristocracy, though her pallet is green. To my surprise, their outfits look very familiar. They’re both dresses that I designed, dresses I sold to save Meems’s chasis.
I pause, outraged. “Carsai? But they hate each other. How could she?”
“Don’t make a spectacle of yourself, dear.” Uncle Simon tugs my arm, reminding me that we’re still on the red carpet, too obvious to everyone in the room. I trudge after him, allowing him to guide me behind a large painting of a cottage in a garden filled with flowers. As we draw closer the image seems to blur into delicate brushstrokes.
Uncle Simon notices my interest in the painting. “Impressionism. Things aren’t always what they seem from a distance. This one is a Monet. It used to be quite valuable in the old world.”
I peek around the gilt golden frame and find Delia again, my chest tight. “I just don’t get it. Why are they friends?”
Plopping himself down on a brocade armchair that creaks under his weight, Uncle Simon reaches for a half finished glass of wine that some flighty Aristocrat abandoned on a side table. “Best leave her to the wolves; she’s a lost cause now.” As he lifts it, the glass leaves an ugly gray-white ring on the polished surface of the wood. Uncle Simon notices and touches the ring. “It’s only a matter of time before they understand the atrocity they’ve become. The game was meant to make them see, but the privileged never open their eyes. It’s only when things get hard and frightening that they begin to realize. The Disfavored are much more malleable; it only took a few months of your father’s game for them to realize what they’re missing.”
“But she was my best friend,” I whisper.
He sighs, as if frustrated that I don’t want to listen to his tirade. “And she lost you,” he reasons. “What do you expect it was like for her when she realized her only other kindred reject was never coming back? How outcast do you think she felt? Abandoned by you and by society?”
I bite my lip. “I never thought about it that way. Poor Delia, being forced to conform just so she didn’t stick out so bad.” Suddenly I’m ten times happier that I planted the Anansi Virus. In the new world, it will be better for Naturals. The Aristocrats will treasure anything not tainted by technology.
Uncle Simon scoffs. “Poor Delia.” He downs the remaining wine in a single gulp. “Don’t cry too hard over her. She’s found her happy place now. Just look at her, have you ever seen such a happy little sheep?”
I watch Delia interact with Carsai and her cronies. One would never be able to tell that Carsai had once hated Delia, that she and those other girls spurned her. And Delia does look happy. Absolutely giddy that, a few hundred thousand credits and months of painful surgery later, she’s finally accepted. Any sign of my old best friend is gone.
Maybe she doesn’t need my revolution after all. I turn away
and sit in a chair matching my uncle’s. “I suppose it would be stupid to try and talk to her.”
“Very. You’re dead. Be dead.”
I take a deep breath and let it out. “So, I’m here. Now what?”
He waves his hand at me, dismissive. “You’re young and beautiful, go have fun. This is a ball, after all.”
I blink at him. “What about Guster?”
“What about him?”
Slight panic mounts in my voice. “You promised I could see him.”
He smiles at me. “Oh, you’ll see him. By the end of the night, if neither of you has figured the other’s identity, I’ll point him out to you.” He gives me a little wink.
I grimace. “Gee, thanks a bunch.”
Chapter Forty-three
Post-American Date: 7/3/232
Longitudinal Timestamp: 9:14 p.m.
Location: Dome 5: Evanescence
For a long time, I simply stand and watch. Not many people notice me. It had been an easy decision to design my holo-mask to project Nadine’s face. Even though I have to hide behind a mask, Guster would know Nadine’s face. Plus, Nadine is pretty enough that she doesn’t stand out too badly; she looks almost Custom. It’s a fairly decent likeness. I don’t look entirely like her, my hair is still that curly brown, but it’s good enough.
I stare out one of the nano-windows. I get a full 360 degree view of Evanescence from here. Nothing but the city and the inside of the dome. We’re too high, too far from the walls, to see the Disfavored or the wastelands from here. I would have once found this view beautiful, but now I long for trees and cloudy blue sky.
“What would you think of all this, Nadine? Of what I’ve chosen to become and what I’ve done?” I whisper against the nano-window. I think that Nadine would approve of my positive vision of the future. I try to imagine what she’d say to me right this moment, but all I can think of are her last words. You brought us here to die.