But pretty much everything else had. A prime example was the room around him. He was in a lovely suite on the 87th floor of the Crowley building. Mr. Crowley had seen to it he would get a very nice room. Jade and Angelo had dropped him off about an hour ago and told him to get some rest, tomorrow was a big day.
Seriously? Tomorrow was a big day?
Today he had been attacked by a killer bot at work, travelled through time, been part of a war, witness to a plague, and told he had to help fix it. No, today was a big day. Tomorrow had to be nanometers in comparison.
Tired, he was. Like he had never been in his life. Except for that one time his sister demanded he run a 10k in the middle of a Topeka heat wave. But no. Not even then was he as tired as he was now.
Still, he couldn’t go right to sleep after he met the lovely girl hologram, Paris. The suite he was in had all sorts of usefulness. There was a ServBot butler who had gotten him a very nice tasting beer. Unfortunately, it had appeared that Amstel Light didn’t exist any longer, but the Crowley-brand lager was quite good. Spectacular windows let him look out over the city. It was still buzzing with life, as thousands of PatrolBots did what they did best, patrolled. He imagined that with the attack today, they were more numerous than usual.
Paris was a wealth of information, and Charlie was in the dark about the three-hundred-year gap in between his time and now.
“Paris, why are there no more restaurants?”
Paris began explaining the demise of brick and mortar restaurants in the city as Charlie watched a player named Telmond hit a 500-foot home run. Royals 3, Pirates 1. The first thing Charlie had asked Paris when he first arrived was an obvious one. Tell me about Charlie Richards. He was pleased to find history thought of him fondly. The realization of the capabilities of hybrid technology was a recent one, in the last century or so. His code had been theorized throughout the centuries, but it was Blake Crowley, already a self-made billionaire as the leading supplier of wireless power worldwide, who developed it into a business and made himself a self-made trillionaire.
“Paris,” Charlie mused, “any wars happen in the last century?” Paris told Charlie about the Damascus Wars in the 23rd century that had changed the global landscape as Charlie sipped his beer and watched a double play.
Positive things had happened as well. Apparently, we had attempted a colony on Mars (an epic fail it turned out, so maybe not positive, but we had made a serious attempt at it-yay,) cured pain, admitted global warming was real and solved it, and had been greeted by an alien race, gotten along, and even exchanged citizens as part of a complex galactic exchange student program. Apparently, some of these aliens still lived here today, though their numbers had dropped significantly due to some political difference between the civilizations.
It was clear these were trying times. Hybrids, people, were dying and war was knocking on the door. He didn’t want to do it, but he had to. He told Paris to turn off the game and tell him about the plague.
“Rumors of the Hybrid Plague, also known as Devolve, or Richards Disease, are unsubstantiated. We assure you, it doesn’t exist.” While Paris’ expression hadn’t changed, it felt like it did. Her tone felt colder, and flat. It was unfortunate, they had been getting together so well.
Charlie, of course, knew better. They might be denying it to avoid a panic, but Charlie had seen it with his own two eyes. It had been a lot harder on Charlie than he would have thought possible. Charlie was no god. While he didn’t feel responsible for what was happening to hybrid race, he did. Kind of. There seemed to be a feeling that hybrids and humans were separated not just by race, but by being different beings altogether. He didn’t know how it had happened, but he knew the shape of the world, and this just wasn’t true. Just because one has mechanical parts doesn’t mean they aren’t human. Humanity is in the soul and no mechanics would replace that.
Charlie hadn’t done anything, yet this was all his doing. He had to have the power to change it. They hybrids were dying which meant, to him, humanity was. He remembered playing a card game with his nephew, Alex. Holy crap, that was yesterday! The hero, Haladin, could rebuild the city. This was exactly what this century needed right now, someone to rebuild.
Charlie said good night to Paris and headed for bed. Jade had been right about one thing, tomorrow was going to be a long day.
Chapter 14
Ding dong.
Charlie’s eyes flittered open with regret. He had no idea where he was, and felt like he could sleep another three centuries. His eyes burned like he had drunk eleven beers (only two, he promised.) Charlie stared up at the ceiling. The room was white as snow. Where was he? When was he?
Ding dong.
Relief came to him. Everything had just been a dream. There were no robots trying to kill him and traveling through time. All a dream. His proof? The doorbell went ding dong. Do you really think in the 24th century doorbells would still go ding dong?
Ding dong.
Above Charlie appeared a figure, and Charlie’s stomach dropped. “Hello, Paris.”
“Good morning, Mr. Richards. There is a lady by the name of Jadyn of Crowley at your front door. She is accompanied by a mostly red robot. Shall I have them go away?”
Charlie let out a deep sigh. It wasn’t a dream and he wasn’t going to be allowed to go back to sleep. “No,” Charlie said dejectedly. “Let them in.”
Charlie got into the turbo shower (not the real name of it, but he called it that because it took ten seconds.) After, he shuttered at the thought of putting back on the clothes he just travelled through time with, and so went to the closet. As miniature ServBots gave him a shave, cut his hair, and did other manly grooming things, Charlie opened the closet to find a surprisingly full wardrobe. He expected futuristic type shirts, or sterile all-white ones, but what he found was very 21st century and very expensive looking. They were Armani suits, fourteen of them virtually identical, save for hue, fourteen ties, fourteen dress shirts, and fourteen black shoes. The suit looked very much like the one Mr. Crowley was wearing when they had met. He wondered if he had this stocked for him or if this as just another room he owned.
Well, if Charlie Richards was going to play the part of hero, he was going to have to look the part. To his pleasant surprise, they fit like they were tailored to every inch of his body.
* * *
“Whoa.” Even Jade couldn’t hide her surprise.
“Not bad, eh?” Not bad indeed. He had chosen the ash grey suit and a nice light blue (go Royals!) tie. He looked like a new, GQ-cover-worthy man.
“I do say, good sir.” Angelo nodded approvingly. “You look simply dapper.”
“Thank you, Angelo. So!” Charlie clasped his hands together. “I figured it was going to be a pretty light day. Was thinking of catching a movie?”
“Huh?” Jade said stupidly. A combination of not getting what he was talking about and still being surprised to see Charlie.
“Okay, then.” Charlie said seriously. “No movie.”
* * *
They took the elevators (yup, elevators were still the most widely used technology for traveling between floors) down to the fourth floor. It turns out Blake Crowley was a huge fan of classical 21st century architecture and design. Signs of it were in the hallways, the design of the elevators. It also explained his suit and why the doorbell in his room went ding dong.
The elevator came to a stop at some unmarked floor. As the door slid opened, Charlie was greeted with a thousand audible gasps.
Charlie saw Blake waiting for him first. He had a huge charming smile like usual. Then he looked out beyond him at a sea of people staring at him in amazement. The technology had changed, but he knew a room full of programmers when he saw it. “My people.”
Jade smiled. “Your work is now their work.”
“Charlie!” Blake exclaimed excitedly. “Good to see you again. And my, don’t you look the part in that fine suit. I’m glad you found it. Now, you ready to get to work?”
&nbs
p; Blake led the way, prompting the group to follow him through the programmers towards a huge main control bank at the far end. Treating him like a god is indeed how the people he passed reacted. He heard whispers of excitement and pointing and oh my god, it’s him. One person even reached out to touch him and looked like he was going to faint after doing so.
It was a mammoth programming room. There were the thousand or so programmers in the room, as well as hundreds of bots running around doing various tasks (they did not stop to gawk at Charlie.) There weren’t computers or keyboards he could see, just pieces of glass for the programmers to swipe at. It all seemed to feed into the large main control bank, code projected across it like the New York Stock Exchange. Within the room was doors to another room that was guarded by colossal ProtectoBots. Out of that room came a kid, early twenties, impeccably dressed and walking with a planet’s worth of ego. He came up to meet them.
“Dustin,” Blake said to the kid. “Meet Charlie.”
Dustin held out his hand. “It is an absolute honor,” though his face betrayed the words. All the other programmers in the room had a look of awe upon seeing Charlie, but not this kid. And Charlie knew that look, he worked with programmers all the time. It was the look when they thought they knew everything and others knew nothing. It was not a rare look in the programming world. Charlie hated this type more than anyone. Anytime one was hired at Bandicoot in management level, they threw out the current ways of doing things and declared themselves the smartest person in company.
Charlie was quite sure they weren’t going to get along.
Dustin was quite sure he and Charlie were not going to get along.
Look, Dustin wasn’t an asshole. Just ask Dustin. He appreciated Charlie’s work. It was pioneering stuff at the time.
But come on, Blake! What the hell was he thinking? Charlie’s knowledge base is from centuries ago! You think some guy with a three-century old knowledge base and intelligence was going to come here and show him what to do? The current code was billions of lines long, they were written in a program that didn’t even exist in Charlie’s time, they involved genetic sequencing and an evolutionary user interface design. Come now, Blake. You’re the most powerful man in the world, but not the smartest. That’s why he had hitched his wagon (very antiquated phrase but he liked it) to Warren. Warren could see the way of things. Even now, hybrid technology’s possibilities were being vastly underutilized. Basically, it was there to make rich man Crowley even richer. Yeah, people could live hundreds of years, but it could be so much more. People could be stronger. Smarter. Run faster. They were just scratching the surface of possibilities. The plague was what it was, just a bug they were working on, which they would soon fix. If some hybrids die, it is what it is. Just think of the future. Not think “let’s go back hundreds of years” and use that code. Forward, not backward.
Warren would be running things one day. Dustin was sure he was one of the five smartest people on the planet, and he knew where to put his chips. If Warren was going to be the most powerful man, he was going to be the second. And with the possibilities of hybrid technology opened, they could rule and live nearly forever.
He wasn’t about to have some 21st century digitally-aged man ruin it.
“Alright,” Dustin said with a large grin. “Let’s begin.”
They were in the inner core room that belonged to Dustin. Just Blake, Charlie and Dustin. Jade was left behind in the main room.
Dustin began to explain as fast and as complicated as possible. Charlie wasn’t sure if it was intentional or not, he imagined it was, but he was completely and utterly lost. It was overwhelming, to say the least. The code he one day began was only slightly recognizable. Panic gripped him. He needed a beer at The Lonely Tavern. He needed to sit alone and think. Dustin was going on and on about how the code evolves using hereditary PLNA links…blah blah blah. There was absolutely no way he would be able to do this.
The panic elevated. No one seemed to notice the cold sweat forming at his brow. But maybe they did notice. Dustin talked faster and faster and seemed to be enjoying every minute of it. Numbers and characters flew across the screen at lightning speed.
What would happen when he told them he couldn’t help? Would they send him back to the past? Was he still in the past or is he just a missing person now? Does his work continue if he’s not there? Would Blake even let him go or would they send Genesis, the sequel, after him? His head was swimming. It was too much to take.
“Charlie?” Blake asked, concerned.
“Huh?”
“I said, do you think you could help us?”
He felt Blake’s eyes on him. If he said no, then what? Would they just send him back in time? Was he just stuck here? Was he…useless to Blake?
“Of course,” he said with a shaking voice.
Blake nodded.
“Excuse me.” Charlie turned and ran out the door. He ran into out into the main room past the eyes of thousands of programmers. He rushed past Jade and Angelo and out into the hallway. He didn’t know where he was going, he didn’t care. He just needed to get out of there.
Chapter 15
The Hanging Gardens of Babylon were on the 23rd floor of the Crowley building. Charlie couldn’t find his way out of the Tower, but at least he found some fresh air. The gardens were designed just as he had seen of artist renditions of the original gardens three thousand years ago. He lay in the perfect grass and looked up into the sky.
The clouds were indeed amazing. They were manmade structures, but they still changed like real clouds. They were slightly transparent like real clouds, which was amazing considering he knew there were bots inside. How did they do that? And they took shape more succinctly than real clouds. But what happened to all the real ones? Maybe they just modified the real ones instead of replaced them. That was it, they were hybrid clouds! Everything here was becoming integrated.
Charlie watched a cat-shaped cloud float on by. Its catlike resemblance was astounding. It even had whiskers.
“That’s Moses.” Charlie took a quick glance at Jade standing beside him as he lay in the grass. “Every day at eleven, Moses floats by.” She nodded at the cat.
Charlie turned back to stare up into the sky. He didn’t want to talk to her. He wasn’t in the mood to talk to anyone. He wanted to go home.
Jade turned to Angelo and told him to give them a moment. Angelo happily strolled off to find some garden wanderers to compliment. “Madam,” he said to a woman passing. “Colors seem brighter when you are around!”
Jade lay down beside him. Charlie sighed. Couldn’t she just go away?
“Next up comes Blade.” Jade shifted in the grass uncomfortably. “He looks like a cow, but is actually supposed to be a Beefalo.”
Charlie chucked. “A cow and a buffalo? Of course, a hybrid animal.”
Jade gave a small grass filled shrug. “Blake insists. And Moses is no ordinary cat.”
Soon enough, Charlie watched as a Beefalo came floating by.
Jade proceeded with caution. She didn’t know if Charlie could help, but she needed him to try. Her life was depending on it. “I can’t even imagine this, Charlie. I took you from your home, you were given an impossible mission. Three centuries have passed, how could you possibly know- “
Charlie cut her off. “What is your official job title?” He wasn’t in the mood to hear about all the difficult things he was going through and supposed to do.
“I don’t have one.” She said it calmly, because she could tell he was upset. If she said the wrong thing, Charlie would probably just shut down. “I do as I’m told.”
“What if Blake asked you to kill someone?”
Jade remained emotionless. “How truthful do you want me to be?”
“So, you have? You’re an assassin?”
“I am many things.”
Charlie took a deep breath, remembering the dangerous game he was playing. He didn’t really know Jade, he trusted her more than the others out of nec
essity. He was a stranger in a strange land. But if Blake saw there was no need for Charlie, and he asked Jade to do what she’s told… “What happens if I tell you I can’t help?”
“Then, unless the programmers come up with something, hybrids are going to die. I’m going to die.”
Charlie paused a second. He didn’t want her making it about that, he wanted to know what happens to him. Can’t he even be selfish for one sec?! “Yeah, but what happens to me? You’re an assassin. An assassin! I’m having a hard time coming to terms with everything right now.”
“Charlie, if you weren’t, I’d be worried. Because then you’d be crazy.”
“Oh, I’m pretty sure I’m crazy.”
“It’s a crazy world. And you’ve been put in the worst of it. Trust me, these are all long shots. You were a long shot. Getting you here was a long shot.”
“Then what’s the point?”
Jade stayed quiet for a good minute. A zonkey (zebra + monkey) cloud floated by. Finally, she turned her head to Charlie. “It’s been a long few days. Come on, let’s take a trip.”
“Long? Pft. I’m just laying here looking at messed-up animal clouds.”
“Come on. Let’s go.”
“Where to?”
Jade got up and brushed the grass off her clothes. “To Trenchtown.”
* * *
Trenchtown was a well-hidden part of Crowley. It was in the southwest sector, out of sight behind large, solid black buildings. Despite the name, to say it was a slum, in 21st century standards, was not at all accurate. In fact, it was a decent looking neighborhood, rows of brick condos. It made Charlie feel very much at home, as it felt not unfamiliar. But it certainly wasn’t on par with the decadence and technology of the rest of the city.
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