“You’ll do fine. The tunnels are safe, they’re all reinforced.”
“It’s not that.” She traced the hard line of the access bar bisecting his chest.
“What is it, then? Are you afraid of the dark?” He reached over and dug his thick fingers into her ribs, making her squeal and pull away from his warmth.
“No.”
“What, then?”
“It’s the smell. The petrichor seeps under my skin and I feel like I’m drowning in it. There’s so much dirt. I forget sometimes how big the planet is. There are only a handful of Mezna cities and even fewer human reservations left, but there’s all this wild open space—the Acid Seas, the Feral Wilds. It gives me the creeps, and being under there, it’s like you’re a part of all that.”
“You think too much,” Virgil teased before frowning and pulling her tight against his body. “Don’t fitz out again. That scared me.”
“Me too.” She nuzzled close and let herself drift off, breathing in the metallic tang of Virgil.
In the morning, Avi trudged to the tunnels. It took all her effort not to hide and pretend she wasn’t a 5ive at all, that she could get a job out in the city and come home at night to Virgil’s smile. All her life she’d fought against being categorized, against being nothing more than her series designation, but now that’s what it all came down to. There were no other options for her. She would never live anywhere but Nuuk and she would never be anything but a 5ive.
The smell hit her before she could see the stairwell that led into the 5ive Center. There she’d get her first work assignment and take the lift down into the depths of the earth. The center was white and pristine, like the rest of the city. But no matter how hard the terraformed walls and ground worked to keep the room clean, absorbing all the dust and gravel the Teks carried on their clothes and shoes, it could never get rid of the smell.
“Avendui 5ive,” she said, introducing herself to the 5ive holding a vidscreen. She waited until he acknowledged her.
“You’re in the depths, so you’ll be bunking below tonight.”
“This is my first day back.”
The Tek raised an eyebrow and snorted. “So?”
She took a deep breath, but felt faint. She took another, too fast. Too much oxygen flooded her system. She needed to breathe. The room felt full, everyone’s voice rising to a volume that drilled inside her brain. Her skin itched and tingled and every thought ended abruptly as the next one interrupted. All the while, a chant of ‘in the depths’ swirled through her mind.
“I can’t...” She gasped, the white ceiling brightened as she looked up, and for a moment she thought she was flying. The world became soft and gentle like a cloud as she drifted, and she’d never have to think about anything but Virgil again. Maybe they could live in the Greenland Human Reservation. He’d stand out because of his size, but she could hide her exo-implants if she wore long pants.
And then everything went black.
* * *
Virgil stood outside the Upper 5ive dorm for two days.
He didn’t eat.
He didn’t leave when the guards threatened him with their sparking blue staffs.
They were smaller than him anyway, so he felt no threat.
On the third day, one of the nuns brought him water and asked if he’d like a chair.
“No, thank you, Sister. I’ll wait like this.”
“She’s not here,” the nun said, confirming what everyone else had told him.
“I’ll wait until she comes back.”
When the nun left, Virgil placed the glass of water on the ground and resumed his wait.
On the fourth day, Virgil felt faint. He hadn’t left his spot except for the rare trip to the bathroom. He needed food. No matter how strong his body had been coded, every creature needed sustenance to survive.
Virgil clenched his fists. He wouldn’t leave until someone told him where Avi had been taken.
She’d never returned from her first day below. Virgil had worried but knew she might be tired. After a few days he checked 3Spek to see if she’d been admitted to the infirmary again. He should have known right away, he’d set up an alert, but maybe it had faltered. He slipped into the weave, deeper than he had since they’d lost Nelson, but couldn’t find her anywhere. It wasn’t until the next week that his panic set him on this ridiculous course of action. No one cared if one 9ine stood sentry forever outside the Upper 5ive dorms. No one cared if he starved to death. There were other 9ines lined up to replace him. Moving, exchangeable parts. That’s all they were.
Avi had tried to tell him that so many times, but he’d never understood until she was gone.
That night, he sat on the floor, his long legs stretched out before him, filling the entire hall. He nodded off as the darkness overtook him and roused to a gentle touch on his shoulder.
“Brother 9ine,” a soft voice beckoned him from his sleep. It sounded like her, his Avi, but she had never been soft. She had always been the strong one.
He opened his eyes to find a young nun sitting before him with a full blue habit covering her from head to toe. She kept her eyes down but he knew they were blue, like every other person whose DNA was laced with Mezna biology.
“Sorry, sister. Am I in the way?” He wiped the sleep from his eyes, trying to focus his vision. The young nun looked like...
“No, Brother 9ine, you are fine. The Order asked me to see to your needs. Should I bring you food?”
Virgil stared. The tiny body he knew so well hid between layers of fabric, and her face had none of the sharp curiosity he’d always loved, but somewhere inside, he knew what had happened to her.
“Avi?” He reached out for her veil.
“Brother!” She jumped out of the way, stopping him from pushing back her headdress so he could see if her head had been shaven, if the telltale black veins ran beneath the thin skin of her skull. Nuns were supposed to be free of biotek, but he knew it was her.
The nun attempted to stand, but as she did, she tripped on the edge of her skirt and tumbled backwards, the fabric pulling up and exposing her metal plated shins.
“Avi?” Her name sliced him like razors as it slipped from his mouth.
“No, you have me confused with someone else.”
And then she looked at him, directly in the eye. No spark of recognition. No lingering look or secret smile to tell him she remembered who he was. Who she was. Who they had been.
Avendui 5ive had been recogged and would never know him again.
A Word from P.K. Tyler
Ecology, biology, technology, everything about our lives is getting more intermixed and a little scary. What if we can’t save ourselves? What if it takes someone else to save us?
In the distant world of the Teks, an alien race known as the Mezna have saved humanity from the brink of destruction, but what have we traded in exchange for their help? What would we be willing to give up? In humanity’s history we’ve seen that people are willing to sacrifice freedoms for the sake of safety. We are even willing to turn on our own if necessary.
In “Avendui 5ive” you meet one possible sacrifice we might make. A caste-like system is created where abandoned children are taken in by the religious ruling class and transformed on a physical and cellular level to perform certain tasks necessary to keep the world running smoothly. Sorted by series and specialized by role, their humanity is stripped away piece by piece.
With Avendui and Virgil, the importance of a Tek’s ability to perform in their role is questioned. Is there more to being human? When function is the basis by which a person’s value is judged, is there any room for love?
The story of “Avendui 5ive” is set in the world of my Mezna novels, a science fiction series about a future Earth where pure-blooded humans live in Eco-Zone Reservations and human/mezna hybrids enjoy a utopian existence in the Mezna cities. The series explores questions about what it means to be free, both in your life but also in your mind. A5 touches on just one of the groups e
xplored in this world and I can’t wait to introduce you to the rest through the coming novels as well as more short stories I’m working on.
All my life I’ve been an avid reader of science fiction and in my writing I’ve tried to hold on to the core of what I believe good scifi requires, an exploration of not just science, but religion and culture. The Mezna series is strongly influenced by the work of Frank Hubert and Nicolas Roeg. For those who look closely, I’m sure you’ll see a little of my love for Robert A. Heinlein as well.
Watch for more from the world of the Mezna coming soon from Evolved Publishing. While you wait, check out my other books ranging from a Muslim superhero (Shadow on the Wall), to a cross-species hybrid searching for a home (Two Moons of Sera).
You can find all about my projects on my website (www.PKTyler.com) or subscribe to my newsletter (www.pavartiktyler.com/pavarti-k-tyler-newsletter-sign-up/) to get the latest news and special subscriber giveaways!
Award-winning author of multi-cultural and transgressive literature, P,K. Tyler is an artist, wife, mother and number cruncher. In addition to literary fiction and Sci-Fi, P.K. also writes erotica and romance under the name Pavarti K. Tyler.
She graduated Smith College in 1999 with a degree in Theatre. After graduation, she moved to New York, where she worked as a Dramaturge, Assistant Director and Production Manager on productions both on and off Broadway. Later, Pavarti went to work in the finance industry for several international law firms.
The best way to stay up to date with Pavarti is to join her mailing list. If you do, she'll even send you a free short story! Sign up at http://www.pavartiktyler.com/pavarti-k-tyler-newsletter-sign-up/. Follow her at www.PKTyler.com
Indigo
by Moira Katson
“SCHEHERAZADE,” THE WOMAN SAID SOFTLY.
The cyborg looked over. She said nothing in response, a still pool with the ripples fading as the word’s echoes were processed and lost. She had grown accustomed to waiting for human clarification. Humans, with their incomplete sentences and their fractured thoughts. Her presence brought up musings that tumbled from her clients’ lips in fragments and half-stories, and she gathered them up piece by piece and held them until the edges caught together and a pattern emerged. Sometimes it never did; she had not grown accustomed to that. No matter how she calmed herself, consciousness pooling and spreading, the lack of sense could not be removed in the mission wipe; she would spend the days between missions with a feeling of incompleteness.
She did not speak of it. It was the sort of thing she was permitted to know about herself, strictly speaking, and yet where she might easily confess to a tremor in a muscle or a sense of melancholy, she kept this particular confession under the same veneer of unnatural stillness that pervaded everything she did. She was confident in this subterfuge—which she suspected was not permitted.
Still, she had noticed the uncertainty in their eyes when they examined her. There were so many things that might be normal now; they could not be entirely sure what would indicate a problem. They were oddly more confident, in fact, when her presence made them uncomfortable.
Therefore it was allowed, perhaps even expected, that she did not have a compunction to answer their questions, the way she would have Before. In truth, the sheer number of answers stopped her mouth. Which one was correct? She could answer the question they had asked, the question they meant, the question that would solve the problem that they were still blind to. She rarely answered that last question, as it made people nervous. She hadn’t figured out yet why that was. It was why she was hired, was it not? And she hadn’t figured out why people became so philosophical in her presence.
A curious gaze drew her attention back to the client. People had a way of watching her that said they wished to touch her, as if they might understand with their fingertips what made her Other, even if their minds could not grasp the difference.
“Scheherazade,” the cyborg said softly as a prompt, because she was consumed with impatience, waiting for the client to finish thinking. Such a prompt was unlike her; she filed it away as a failure. On the next job, she would do better.
“Not really,” the client said, and the cyborg imagined stretching out her hand and cupping the two pieces of information there, swirling around each other like river stones: Scheherazade; not really. “Because you’re the thousand and one stories yourself, aren’t you? Every night a different woman.”
The cyborg had the sense from her human upbringing to recognize that the exact timespan was metaphor. She watched the woman gravely, because it was still not enough information, but no more was forthcoming. The woman drew away and picked up her briefcase and left with only a murmured formality for a goodbye, while the cyborg reciprocated and did not look at the briefcase. She thought she would have noticed that it was heavier than usual, but the woman did not. Those in charge of the plan had assured the cyborg that this would be the case.
The client would never get far enough to open the briefcase, of course, but if she had, she would have found the information she requested, laid out neatly in folders. This had taken the cyborg some time, and one human counterpart had asked why she bothered. She had no answer. She could not tell if honor demanded it, or if it humored her, and she had the sense to realize that the latter would be considered inappropriate.
She had seven minutes before her shuttle would arrive, and curiosity drew her to the tiny monitor that waited in the corner. Her fingers danced over the interface, and she chewed on her bottom lip as she read the story of One Thousand and One Nights, of a woman bartering falsehoods for her life, of a land far gone in time and space.
It made her feel a subtle sort of pain, like the feeling of pressing on a bruise, to hear humans tell stories of old Earth. They clearly meant something, but she did not know what anymore, because all she could think was that the place was gone and the stories were resting on nothing at all. She was always afraid that her clients would realize that in the middle of the story, and she was not sure what would happen then.
She finished reading, but did not understand the reference to this story. She was the one thousand and one stories, the client had said, but what happened on the thousand and second night? Her usual irritation with leaving a thought unfinished, a pattern unrealized, was like a splinter in her mind. It was important to understand, she sensed, for when the wipe was done, the best she would have would be an easier path to this conundrum in the future. She could sometimes sense the echoes of past thoughts, like a well-trodden path, but what use was that if the world never brought her back to this thought?
When the shuttle arrived, the cyborg was neatly dressed with her long black hair caught back in a braided bun, face clean, hands washed of any residue that might catch in the spaceport scanners. As the shuttle banked away, an explosion ripped through the heart of the building, unfolding from a single unassuming briefcase. They were exactly out of range—those who had hired her being remarkably exact about such things—and the cyborg unfolded her fingers to reveal a tiny piece of paper curled in her palm.
SCHEHERAZADE, it said, in printed capital letters.
The cyborg pondered for a moment, and then dropped it between the seat and the wall, into the tiny alcove no one ever cleaned, even at Getz Corp. They would wipe her as soon as she reached the recovery dorms, and she would not remember the whispered words. But she always looked down between the seat and the wall, and it occurred to her now that the mannerism had simply been waiting for a purpose.
*******
All things considered, the agent found it rather amusing that the biggest war of the millennium might have been sparked by a mistake. Everyone wanted Getz Corp’s upgrades, and no one had the training programs to accommodate the latest and best—which was, of course, the only thing anyone wanted to buy. According to the contracts, top-of-the-line cybernetic enhancements were reserved for Getz Corp’s own professionals, and if the military decided not to care, things like this happened.
Well, they’d been
warned.
More amusing, the incident happened at Fatrath. Up until that point, the planet had been important only to the pilgrim collective that had named it in the hopes of settling it, and to the peculiar form of lichen that turned out to be the only life form capable of living long-term on the planet's surface. Neither group expressed an opinion on the events that followed—the pilgrims being rather gruesomely dead and the lichen adhering to a policy of steadfast neutrality that it would maintain throughout the ensuing centuries of war.
Fatrath’s system, out of the way, with six planets and twenty-three lunar bodies, made an excellent training ground for each crop of new pilots recruited into the increasingly tense cold war.
And so it was that the IGFS Phoenix, threading between Fatrath’s three moons as it attempted a blind approach, completed its maneuver so successfully that it came nose to nose with a Bourian scout ship before either of them realized what was happening. The scout ship veered out into the abyss of space, and the pilot of the Phoenix, recently drafted from FedEx IG Shipping and upgraded with Getz Corp’s latest line of reflex enhancements, turned the yoke too sharply and sent the Phoenix over the edge into Fatrath’s gravity well.
Within 2.8 seconds, the Bourian scout ship had altered its course back to its capital, the lead scout being very well aware that the Phoenix could not pull up in time, and worse, that the scout ship’s presence would already have been detected before the Phoenix veered. Indeed, three minutes later, the scout ship’s exact make, trajectory, and weaponry were included in distress signals streaking through sublight space to the Hantu capitol, and the Phoenix lay in a smoking wreck on Fatrath’s surface.
The Cyborg Chronicles (The Future Chronicles) Page 18