Three Days in April

by Edward Ashton

  “Look,” he says. “There’s no point in getting worked up about it until I get a chance to run the files through an actual fab unit.”

  A bead of sweat runs down my forehead. I really don’t like where this is going.

  “Actually, I’m getting kind of worked up already,” I say. “Why don’t you tell me what you’re thinking, pal?”

  He looks at Terry, and then Charity, and then me.

  “Well,” he says. “You know we’ve been talking about what happened in Hagerstown, right?”

  The tingle in my stomach turns into a sharp, stabbing pain. Anders goes on.

  “Nobody’s been able to come up with an explanation that makes any sense. Your guys said the same thing, right, Gary? A virus or a toxin wouldn’t be able to act against so many ­people over that big of an area at exactly the same time. The only idea that came close was the one the UnAltered were floating—­the kill switch.”

  “Right,” says Terry. “But the kill rate was too high for it to be just Engineered and Augmented, even in Hagerstown . . .”

  “But everybody in Hagerstown drinks BrainBump,” says Charity.

  “If I had to guess,” says Anders, “I’d say probably about ninety percent of them, anyway.”

  Everyone is looking at me.

  “So you think somebody snuck poison into the BrainBump production line?” Terry asks. “That doesn’t make sense either, does it? I mean, wouldn’t Gary be dead by now?”

  And with that my stomach heaves, spewing pizza and grape soda and rum all over my hardwood floor.

  They’re all yelling and jumping up and generally making asses of themselves, when a chat frame pops into my field of view.

  Angry Irish Inch:

  Sir Munchalot:

  He called me Gary. Fuck me.

  Angry Irish Inch:

  A timer shows up in my left eye and starts counting backward from forty. I blink the chat frame closed and lurch to my feet.

  “Whoa there,” says Terry. “Easy, boy.”

  “Shut up,” I say, and spit out a glob of something vile. “Out. Now.”

  I start for the door.

  “What the hell?” Anders yells after me.

  “There’s a crowbar inbound,” I yell back. I’m already at the door. “We’ve got thirty seconds.”

  I stumble out the door, down the steps and into the street. First Charity, then Anders and Terry together follow after. I duck into the space between the abandoned building across the way and the half-­collapsed garage that sits beside it, drop to my knees and look back. The others pile in after me. It’s not raining anymore, but the clouds are still thick and black, and I’m kneeling in a sticky mix of mud and soaked-­through garbage. The timer Inch started in my ocular is at sixteen . . . fifteen . . . fourteen . . . My front door hangs open, and the two windows above it stare back at me like accusing eyes. Sorry, old buddy. Three . . . two . . . one . . . zero.

  A blinding streak of light connects the peak of my roof to the roiling clouds. I duck down and cover my head with both arms as the shock wave and the thunderclap break over me at the same time. A chunk of something woody slams into my crossed forearms and throws me back into Charity. When I blink my eyes clear, she’s somehow wound up on top of me.

  “So,” I say. “Was that your ex?” My ears are ringing, and I can barely hear myself speak.

  “Maybe,” she says. “I did mention that he loves his crowbars.”

  She rolls off of me, and I lever myself back up to my knees. My house is a crater, and the places on either side are half smashed and leaning away. The place behind did a little better, but I guess they’ll be making a call to Crack Dealer Mutual in the morning as well.

  “They’ll have ground units here pretty quickly,” says Terry. “I think we need to move.”

  14. ANDERS

  “I’ll give you this much,” I say to Gary as he pokes his head out of the alley on Thirtieth and looks around. “You’re taking the destruction of all of your worldly possessions like a man.”

  He gestures us forward, steps out onto the sidewalk, and heads west at a brisk clip.

  “Trust me,” he says. “If that had been all of my worldly possessions, I would be rolling around on the ground, kicking my feet in the air, and screaming like a colicky baby. The occasional burn-­down is part of the cost of doing business. You’d like it to be a little more controlled than that, of course, but hey.”

  “Huh,” I say. “That’s good to know, I guess. The thing is, though . . . that actually was all of my worldly possessions.”

  He looks back at me, one eyebrow raised.

  “Seriously? You don’t have a bolt-­hole?”

  “No, Gary. I do not have a bolt-­hole.”

  He glances up and keeps moving.

  “You do know what I do for a living, right? This is the second time someone’s tried to drop a crowbar on me, and I had to do a self-­burn one other time because somebody’s security avatar managed to back-­trace me all the way to my home system. How could you not have a bolt-­hole?”

  “If it makes you feel any better,” says Terry, “I don’t have a bolt-­hole either.”

  “Neither do I,” says Charity. “Then again, I don’t live with a jacker.”

  “I lived in that house for four years,” I say. “Never once did Gary say anything about keeping my family photos somewhere less likely to explode.”

  “I didn’t tell you to brush your teeth every morning either,” he says. “I’m not your mom, you know.”

  North Charles is a block ahead now. There’s something going on up there. A man sprints across the street, moving south to north; then a woman follows a few seconds later. Another running man comes into view as we move closer. He stops in the middle of the intersection of Charles and Thirtieth, turns, and throws something back the way he came. A second later there’s a muffled bang, and he starts running again, straight down the middle of the street toward us. Gary stops walking.

  “I think we may have a problem,” he says.

  His words are still hanging in the air like a speech bubble in a cartoon when a wave of ­people surges up Charles from the south, and what had been a sort of background roar differentiates itself into a mass of screaming voices. Most of the ­people keep moving north, but a fair number of them follow the rock thrower, who’s almost reached us by now.

  “And now come the riot police,” says Charity.

  On cue, the first black helmets come into view. Shortly after that, a half dozen canisters come arcing toward us. The first of them actually hits the rock thrower in the back of the head, and he goes down screaming as a thick white mist of tear gas sprays out around him.

  “I think we’re headed the wrong way,” says Terry. She turns and starts back down Thirtieth at a jog.

  “No,” says Gary. “This is my bug-­out route. We can’t go back that way.”

  “Come on,” I say. “We can circle around a few blocks and come back at it from the west.”

  “No,” says Charity. “He means that he’s disabled all the stationary surveillance along this route. If we deviate, we’ll be visible to NatSec tracking.”

  “Thank you,” Gary says. “It’s like you’re the only one who speaks English today.”

  I look back and forth between them. Terry’s stopped in front of the alley we just came from.

  “Honestly,” I say, “I don’t think we’ve got a lot of choice here.”

  The wave of rioters breaks over us then, along with the tear gas. Gary doubles over coughing at the first whiff, then gets knocked on his ass as a woman with snot pouring out of her nose and eyes plows into him. Charity steps around him and plants her feet. A fat, bearded guy in a soaking wet flannel shirt stumbles toward her. She dips her s
houlder and swings a forearm, and he staggers backward and falls across the sidewalk. Another man running full-­out trips over the fat guy and skids on his face almost to Charity’s feet. My eyes are tearing up now. I turn away as Terry grabs my sleeve and pulls me back the way we came.

  I’ve never done the running of the bulls in Pamplona, but I’m guessing the next five minutes are a pretty close approximation. I’m half blind and coughing, trying to keep one hand on Terry while running through a mass of screaming rioters and masked and goggled riot police. A few times I have to shove rioters away when they try to grab hold of me, and at one point a cop takes a swing at me with his nightstick. I side-­step the blow and smash the front of his gas mask in with the heel of my hand, then turn and keep running. After what seems like forever, Terry pulls me down a side street and into the space between two rowhouses. One man runs past in the street, then another a few seconds later. The roar of the riot seems to be moving away. I drop into a crouch and cough out a thick, green wad of mucus. Terry vomits against the wall behind us, falls to her knees and leans forward, gasping.

  I sit down, then settle back against a garbage can as my breathing slows and my vision clears. Terry coughs twice, turns her head to the side and spits. I lean my head back and sigh.

  “We have the best times together, don’t we, honey?”

  She looks up at me and starts to laugh, but it turns into a coughing fit that ends in dry heaves.

  “Sorry,” I say. “Didn’t mean to finish you off.”

  “That’s okay,” she says when she can breathe again. “Somebody needed to put me out of my misery.”

  She crawls over next to me, sits back against the can and pulls my arm around her shoulders.

  “Anyway, you’re right,” she says. “We do have the best times.”

  It’s maybe twenty minutes later when Terry stands and pulls me to my feet. The riot seems to have either died down or moved on, and we haven’t heard any screaming in a while.

  “So,” she says. “What’s the plan now?”

  “That’s a good question,” I say. “We can’t really go to my place, so . . .”

  “Yeah, I don’t think my apartment is a good choice right now either.”

  “Why? Does it explode a lot?”

  “Not recently,” she says, “but I’ve got a feeling that might change. You remember Dimitri?”

  “Dimitri?” I ask. “You mean the guy who showed up at my house looking for me on Sunday morning, and who I later saw killing a man in the street outside the Green Goose? Yeah, I’m pretty sure I remember him.”

  She nods.

  “He’s NatSec.”

  “Yeah,” I say. “After the whole cold-­blooded murder thing, I pretty much assumed he was either NatSec or the Ukrainian Mafia.”

  She looks confused.

  “Ukrainian Mafia? Is that a thing?”

  I sigh, and try to rub the burn out of my eyes. It just makes them worse.

  “I have no idea, Terry. Unlike you, I don’t have any connections in killing-­­people circles. I’m starting to think that puts me in a distinct minority around here, though. Just for my own information, does every woman in Baltimore have a NatSec ex-­boyfriend?”

  She scowls. I’m guessing this is a sensitive topic.

  “Dimitri is not my ex-­boyfriend,” she says. “He’s been asking about whether I have a sister, though, so I kind of suspect he’s aware of what happened with Elise on Sunday afternoon. He’s also obviously aware that you and I are . . .”

  “Mixed up together?”

  “Right. Mixed up together. And since NatSec just blew up your house . . .”

  “Gary’s house,” I say. “I just lived there.”

  She shakes her head.

  “Actually, I’m pretty sure that if you did a search you’d see that you’re the only one who was living there. I doubt Gary leaves much of a footprint.”

  I open my mouth to argue, and then close it again. She’s probably right. Gary has a bolt-­hole. And a bug-­out route. And a chain lock and deadbolt, and no electronics on his front door. I can’t believe I lived with a cracker for four years, and never thought about any of this.

  “Fine,” I say finally. “I’m an idiot, and NatSec is probably currently blaming me for every crime Gary has committed over the last four years, but back up a minute. If Dimitri isn’t your ex-­boyfriend, what is he? Brother? Cousin? Pet bear?”

  She shakes her head.

  “He’s just a friend.”

  “The kind of friend who you suspect might be willing to call in an orbital strike on you?”

  She looks down, then away.

  “Yeah, that kind.”

  “Where, exactly, do you go to meet friends like that? Is there a club somewhere?”

  “Not exactly,” she says. “I met him in a support group.”

  I wait for the punch line, but there isn’t one coming. Apparently, she’s serious.

  “A support group?” I ask. “Like Alcoholics Anonymous? I didn’t think NatSec was cool with hiring ­people with substance-­abuse problems.”

  She shakes her head again. She’s not smiling.

  “It wasn’t Alcoholics Anonymous. It was a grief support group—­for ­people who’ve lost their partners.”

  Oops.

  “No,” she says. “Don’t get that way. Mark died three years ago. It was tough for a while, but I’m fine now. Dimitri lost someone at about the same time—­her name was Saria—­and honestly, he was much more messed up about it than I was. Apparently, she just disappeared. He wasn’t even sure if she was dead or alive. He was a wreck, and so was I. We helped each other through it. That’s all.”

  “Huh. And you don’t think your grief counseling earned you enough chits with him to keep him from dropping a crowbar on your house?”

  She shrugs.

  “Maybe. I don’t know that I want to find out.”

  “Okay,” I say finally. “So where does that leave us? We could try to get to Doug’s place, but it’s a good three miles from here, and we’d be subject to surveillance pretty much the whole way.”

  “What about Gary’s bolt-­hole?”

  I sigh again. She hasn’t been paying attention.

  “I know this is surprising,” I say, “but Gary never confided the location of his bolt-­hole to me. Or its existence, actually.”

  “Do you have any way to contact him?”

  I shake my head.

  “I left my phone in the house. I assume you did too?”

  She nods.

  “Probably for the best, actually,” I say. “I’m pretty sure NatSec can trace your phone location if they want to. So where does that leave us?”

  Terry’s jaw drops open and her eyes go wide. A hand touches my shoulder, and I spin fast enough to pop something in my neck. Elise is standing behind me. She jumps back, and raises both hands in surrender.

  “Ow!” I say. “Elise? What the hell?”

  “Sorry,” she says. “I didn’t mean to startle you, but I think you need to come with me now.”

  I look at Terry. Her jaw is still hanging open.

  “Elise?” Terry says. “Where did you come from?”

  “There,” she says, and points to a white cargo van parked across the street. “I’m here to help you. Come with me.”

  She reaches out to me. I look at Terry. She raises one eyebrow and shrugs. Elise is smiling. I take her hand.

  “How did you find us?” Terry asks. “I wasn’t even sure you were still alive.”

  “Honestly,” says Elise, “I’m not one-­hundred-­percent clear on that myself. You really need to talk to Aaliyah.”

  The van is dirty on the outside and worse on the inside, with dark-­tinted windows and three rows of seats.

  “Really?” Terry says. “A child-­stealer van?
”

  “Sure,” says Elise. “I’ve got a basket full of candy and puppies in the back. Wanna see?”

  She climbs into the driver’s seat. Terry waves me into the front passenger seat and then climbs in the back. Elise backs up, swings around, and pulls out onto the garbage-­strewn street.

  “The tinted windows won’t help us,” I say. “We’re way off Gary’s bug-­out route. NatSec must have a bead on us by now.”

  “I don’t think so,” says Elise. “I’m pretty sure they can’t see me.”

  “What do you mean?” Terry asks. “You think you’re ghosted?”

  Elise shrugs.

  “Is that the word for it?”

  “Tariq blanked my building’s security,” Terry says. “Are you saying you can do that too? To the entire panopticon? Even to NatSec assets?”

  “I don’t know,” Elise says, “but do you see anyone chasing us?”

  There’s a long moment of silence. Finally I turn to look at her.

  “Is that how you got out of Hagerstown?”

  “Maybe,” Elise says. “I mean, it seems likely—­but I honestly can’t remember anything between Tariq tackling me, and saying hello to Gary on your front stoop.”

  Terry leans forward between the front seats.

  “Have you always been able to do this? I don’t ever remember you evading government surveillance when we were kids.”

  Elise shakes her head and laughs.

  “Oh, no. This just started earlier this afternoon, actually.”

  “Fine,” I say. “You can move without being seen. That still doesn’t explain how you found us.”

  “I saw you,” Elise says. “I thought about Terry, and I saw where you were. I don’t know how it works. It’s just something I can do now.”

  “This explains why Tariq thought he could get into Chantilly,” says Terry.

  “Let’s stay focused,” I say. “You said this just started this afternoon. Did anything unusual happen around that time? Something involving a fairy godmother, maybe?”

  “Actually, yes,” says Elise. “I accepted the Gift of the Moon.”