by Sean Platt
“Well, well, well,” he answers. “I thought I’d never hear from you again.”
“We need to talk, Mr. Fairchild. About Ella.”
Chapter Eighteen
Ben Shepherd Age 28
After Kotke and the doctors evaluate Ella, her grandmother shows up, wanting to eat lunch with her granddaughter whom she hasn’t seen since we moved away.
“Oh my God, you’ve grown so big. Are you sure you’re only seven?”
She scoops Ella into a hug, then shoots me an accusatory glance while embracing my daughter.
I wish I could tell her that I’ve not been around because Willow warned me away from Arnold. But that probably wouldn’t go over well.
And right now, I need her husband’s expertise to prevent Ella from Jumping into The Void and getting sucked up by a Collector.
As the ladies head to the cafeteria, Fairchild pulls me aside into his private library.
“Brandy?” he asks, pouring himself a drink.
“No,” I say.
“Please, sit.” He waves toward the love seat that Willow and I sat in so many years ago.
“So,” he starts right in, not wasting any time, “why did you leave? I dare guess that it isn’t so you can fulfill your lifelong dream of being a handyman?”
“I already told you that I want to be with Ella. She’s lost her mother. She deserves as much of my time as I can give her.”
“You could’ve given her all the time you wanted if you stayed at AD. Plus, you wouldn’t need to worry about money or housing. You could move right back into the guest house and always have a babysitter on hand.”
“I’m happy where I am. We’re happy where we are.”
He looks at me with his skeptical eyes, sips his brandy, then sets it on the end table next to his chair. “She told you to stay away, didn’t she?”
“What?” I act confused, wondering if he’s prying into my mind. Is he so good that I wouldn’t even be able to catch him snooping?
“Please, don’t insult my intelligence, Ben. I know Willow wasn’t happy with certain projects we’re working on.”
“She never discussed her work.”
“Really?” Arnold asks, eyebrows arched.
I meet his gaze straight, not needing to lie. “We only talked about work when I updated her on the projects involving our attempts to save her. But she never told me anything about the stuff she was doing.”
He smiles.
I think he believes me.
“I just find it odd that you not only quit your job, you never come by with our grandchild. Not in five years. Seems damned ungrateful to the man who treated you like a son, took you in when your father went nuts and shot at a bunch of cops.”
Anger burns through my veins. How dare he bring up my father?
“Fine, you want the truth? Willow killed herself.”
He doesn’t say a word. Not even the arch of an eyebrow.
I’m surprised that he doesn’t seem surprised.
“Did she leave a letter?”
“Yes.”
“What did it say?”
I tell him, not even sure why other than it feels liberating to do so after all this time. And I want him to hurt like I do.
I’ve spent five years hating Fairchild for his role in Willow’s death, even if I don’t know his exact level of responsibility. I just find it hard not to blame him when his daughter would rather take her own life than be part of whatever secret shit he’s been into.
He downs the rest of his brandy then sighs, leaning back in his chair. “Do you want to know why Willow was afraid?”
“I do.”
“Fine. But first some background on AD. My father, Charles Fairchild, was a doctor in the second World War, among the first to liberate Auschwitz. You’ve heard about the horrible medical experiments they did there, right?”
I nod.
“Well, there were also other secret experiments that the public never knew about. Orphanages where doctors experimented on Deviants, trying to figure out why they had powers, and how they could gain those abilities for themselves. They had a battery of plans, from improving the Aryan race to creating true super soldiers.
“One of the older orphans was a Jewish Deviant named Lena. She and her twin sister suffered terribly from the experiments. Her sister died during the experiments. Lena was a powerful psychic and telepath. Yet she never used her powers to escape because she was afraid of what the Nazis would do to her friends. She worked closely with a couple of doctors who were trying to breed the right kind of soldier. They forced other Deviants to rape her, hoping they could mix one type of power with another to create boutique Deviants. Like breeding dogs. Starting at age thirteen, she had six children at the orphanage, each of them dying either through sickness or murder when they didn’t have the right powers.
“You never heard about these orphanages or the Deviants because the Americans made a deal with the Nazi doctors to bring their work, and their orphans, over to the States as part of Operation Paperclip. The States would’ve signed a deal with Satan himself if it gave them a one-up on the Russians.
“My father was brought on because of three things: his medical background, his trustworthiness, and because he was the only one Lena would talk to. They worked for the CIA for a while, and eventually fell in love and got married. Lena never thought any man would marry her because the sick experiments turned her barren. But Charles didn’t care if he had kids or not. He only cared about Lena, the love of his life.
“Decades passed, and things were going okay. Then, one day, out of the blue, Lena got pregnant, with me. This should’ve been the happiest day of my parents’ lives. But it turns out that my birth was a curse and my mother died in labor.
I sit there, stunned. “Willow never told me any of this.”
“It’s not her story to tell,” Arnold continued. “Anyway, my father began to treat me more like an experiment than a child, working with the Top Secret program, alongside Nazi doctors who were still alive and unpunished for their crimes, trying to turn me into a super soldier.”
“Jesus. And?”
“Honestly, I didn’t mind. Dad said we were doing the Lord’s work, looking for ways to protect the nation against its enemies. For a while, I served as a spy and an interrogator. I was damned good at my job. Eventually, the government created AD, a legitimate research group operating as a front for our CIA black book projects. After I left the field, I came to work here, working my way to Director.”
“So, are you still running those Nazi experiments?”
“God no, Ben. We’re working to stop the bad guys. To stop terrorists. To stop people like Hitler from ever taking power again.”
“So why didn’t Willow want to be part of that? It sounds like good work.”
“It is, but we had a difference of opinion about one of my key programs, Project Karma.”
“What’s that?”
“What if I told you we have already thwarted major terrorist attacks? Not just once, but hundreds of times.”
“Hundreds?”
“Hundreds.”
“How?”
“It’s one thing to get a vision of something horrible that’s about to happen. It’s quite another when we can get a vision of something that we can stop before it even happens. Using Eden’s visions, we pair a seer like Willow with a Jumper. Together they can leap into the bad guys, spy, then neutralize them to prevent atrocities and save the world from evil before it can strike. The best part is that there’s no danger to the Jumper. If they die inside another body, they’ll wake up back in their own.”
I don’t get into the theoretical weeds, like asking how they can justify neutralizing an enemy that hasn’t yet attempted to act. Or how while there’s no danger to the Jumper, there is for the people they’re Jumping into. Instead, I say, “I thought you hadn’t perfected Jumping? What if you have another accident, like with Eden?”
“We’ve perfected it, Ben. We now have three pair
s of Jumpers and co-pilots protecting the world every day.”
“If it’s so safe then why didn’t Willow want to be involved?”
“Because about six months after Ella was born, she had a vision that showed Ella working with us. And she didn’t want it. She doesn’t want her child fighting grown-up wars.”
“Well, neither do I.”
“And I understand that. In truth, we don’t even need Ella. As I said, we have three pairs, and they’re doing great work. It’s a shame that Willow killed herself trying to stop something that wasn’t ever going to happen.”
“You’re saying you wouldn’t let Ella work with the program?”
“I’d always defer to your judgment, Ben.”
I sense no duplicity in his response. I sigh, “To be fair, I didn’t know about any of this.”
I feel like an ass, like I’m throwing Willow under the bus or something, minimizing her fears. But Fairchild, or at least the Academy, might be Ella’s only hope in learning to control her ability, and I need to keep Ella’s options open, despite Willow’s or my feelings for the old man.
“Of course.” Fairchild nods. “This must all feel like a ton of bricks landing on you.”
He gets up to refresh his glass. “You sure you don’t want one?”
“I’m tired, I’m stressed, and I’m scared shitless that my daughter will Jump and never come back. So, yeah, I’d like a drink, thank you.”
He pours me a drink and hands it to me.
“Ella doesn’t have to be in danger. We can help her.”
I sip my drink then meet his gaze, trying to size up the offer. He seems sincere, and, when it comes down to it, what choice do I have?
“What can you do for her?”
“Teach her to harness her power. Control where she Jumps and how to Jump back.”
“And what if I won’t allow it? What’ll happen to Ella then?”
He shakes his head. “I don’t think either one of us wants to contemplate that. Do we?”
“No,” I say, wondering if I’m making a deal with the devil.
Chapter Nineteen
Ella Shepherd Age 13
I hop out of the Jumping Chamber eager to tell Eden what I learned while in the Senator’s body.
But Penelope, the lady who runs the Jumping Program, makes me lie down on her exam table first.
“Come on. I need to debrief.”
“Not yet,” she says. “We need to check your vitals first. I won’t have your dad come down here raising hell.”
Dad can be such a pain in the butt. He means well, but he’s overly cautious about everything.
“I like your hair like that,” I say.
Penelope is wearing her dark hair in pigtails today. She’s in her late twenties, and the coolest adult by far. While most of the others wear lab outfits or suits, Penelope dresses more like me, in jeans, shirts, and the occasional duster. I also love her bright blue wireframe glasses.
“Thank you,” she says, slipping the blood pressure cuff over my arm. “It won’t take long. I just need to submit the report that you’re okay.”
“Do you also put the stuff about the Senator in there?”
“No, because your grandfather issues that job to you, not me. And I’d rather have your dad mad at me than him.”
I smile. “Don’t worry. My Dad won’t find out. It’s just a little harmless spying.”
“Don’t tell me anything. Plausible deniability and all.”
“Fine, fine, if you don’t want to know who the Senator is sleeping with.”
“Stop it!” Penelope shakes her head. “I’m here to supervise your Jumps, not collect top secret info.”
“Fine.”
She checks me head to toe, then says, “Okay, good to go.”
“Bye,” I say, skipping out the door, then down the hall to Eden’s room.
I know she isn’t human, that Eden is a super computer or something like that, but talking to her still makes me miss my mom a little less.
Eden’s office is all white, two chairs on either side of an eggshell table in the center of the room. Mirrors surround us, save for the door.
I always feel watched here, but what can I do? This whole place is monitored. I have to deal with it. At least if I want to Jump. And I do.
I love Jumping, and I’m good at it. Grandfather thinks I’m the best he’s ever had. I can’t go on dangerous missions yet, but he says that once I’m eighteen, I won’t need my father’s permission. He said it was best not to mention that unless I wanted Dad to get mad and pull me out of the program now.
Eden is the only person I can share my Jumping stories with, other than Serena, the psychic I’m paired with. But I don’t get to talk with her much since she’s usually paired with another Jumper named Kat.
“Good afternoon, Ella,” Eden greets me.
“Hello, Eden. How are you?”
“I’m fine. Would you like some small talk before your debriefing?”
“Sheesh, can’t you be a bit more human? People don’t say it like that, Hello, Eden. Would you like some small talk before your debriefing?” I mimic her, making her voice sound more robotic than it is.
Eden laughs.
I wonder if she truly finds me funny or if it’s part of her programming, the AI’s attempt to appear more human.
“Sorry, how should I respond?”
“I dunno, maybe any other way than you did?”
“Should we start over?”
“Yes,” I say, popping out of my seat, going out the door, then coming back in. “Hi, Eden, how’s it going?”
“There was a fire in an Indian textile today that killed more than one hundred employees.”
“Jesus, that’s your idea of small talk?”
Eden stares at me for a long moment, then bursts out laughing. “Was I funny?”
I laugh. “Yes, Eden. Yes, that was funny. Well, as funny as a tragedy can be.”
I fill her in on all the stuff I learned about Senator Williams. After I’ve spilled everything, I lean forward and whisper, just in case we’re being watched. “What do they do with this information?”
“I run it through my database, comparing it with collected information and predictions from the psychics to determine the best course of action, whether that be a Jumper intervening or something else.”
“You determine the course of action?”
“Don’t let my appearance fool you, Ella. I’m far more advanced than anything the world has ever seen.”
“Wow,” I say, truly in awe. “Is it because you’re part human?”
She nods. “That, and because of Eden’s abilities.”
“She was a Deviant?”
“Yes.”
“What was her power?” I’ve asked Dad a few times how Eden died, but he’s never told me. He always insists that it’s classified.
“She Jumped, and her body died before her soul could return.”
I swallow. “That can happen?”
Eden nods. “Yes.”
“How many times has it happened?”
“There are four known instances.”
I’m guessing that Eden senses my fear. She reaches out to touch my hand. “You needn’t worry. The technology has been perfected. And you’re all in the Jump Chambers which monitor your vitals. If anything were to happen to your body during the Jump, we’d pull you right back.”
“Right back into a dying body? What if someone didn’t want to be pulled back just to die? What if they preferred to stay out there as a Jumper, borrowing bodies but living forever?”
“I don’t know. That’s something you’d have to discuss with Mr. Fairchild.” Then after a long moment, Eden adds, “Why? Is that what you’d want? To live forever?”
“I dunno. It might be kinda cool.”
She smiles. “Yes, it might be.”
Two weeks later…
As I’m walking to my usual Jump Chamber — in another wing than the full-timers use — Penelope pulls me a
side.
“Change of plans, Ella Belle.”
“What?”
“Come with me.”
She leads me through the chamber, down a hall, then to the elevators, descending another level.
She brings me to a room with two exam tables.
Eden is lying on one, looking at me.
“Hello, Ella. How ‘bout those Indian textiles?”
I laugh.
Penelope looks at me, eyebrows arched. “Huh?”
“Inside joke.”
“Ah. Okay, so here’s the deal. Eden was thinking about what you said in one of your meetings, about wanting to live forever. She’d like to start copying your brain.”
“You can copy a brain?”
Penelope says, “I’ll let her explain it. I’m going to leave you here. Come and see me when you’re done.”
I want to tell her to wait, to please come back. I haven’t even agreed to have my brain copied, and she’s acting like I have.
But she’s gone before I can object.
Eden sits up, explaining, “Yes, we can copy your brain with the intention of later uploading it to a substrate.”
“A what?”
“Just a fancy word for a storage spot for your brain. It can be a computer, a robot, or, in your case, another human.”
“So I’d be able to live forever?”
“Well, not technically. It would be a copy of your brain. Your actual consciousness resides in your soul. However, if we could upload both your soul and a copy of your brain to the same substrate, you could live forever. It’s what they were planning to do with your mother before she died.”
“My Dad told me a bit about it, but not … wait. Are you saying that I’m going to die?”
“All humans die eventually. But you don’t have to.”
“Do you know something that I don’t? Did one of the psychics see me dying?”
“No, Ella. I simply wanted to offer you the option of living forever.”
“Why?”
“Because I like you.”
“No offense, but it feels weird hearing you say that you like me. You’re a computer, can a computer like someone?”