The car hit the ground unevenly and bounced around before coming to a complete stop. The driver rolled his window down.
“Hop in,” he said. “I can give you a ride, Lizzy.”
Ailsa scowled. Who is this guy? The inside of the vehicle was dark in the approaching twilight.
“It’s me,” he said.
“Gabriel?”
“Who’s Gabriel?” he asked in an angry tone of voice.
This is a trick. They sent him. She took a step back.
He activated the cabin light. The face was familiar. He had greying teeth, stubble and a face that sagged slightly.
“It’s me! Milton!”
“Milton? You look different.”
“I’m just a little cleaned up is all.”
“What are you— Did you go through uplift?” she asked.
“It gets ugly around here at night, Lizzy. You should come with me. I have a place. I can keep you safe,” he said.
She walked around the car and got into the backseat.
“I’m going to take care of you, Lizzy. You’re safe now. I promise.”
49
“How did you get this car?” Ailsa asked Milton. She looked around the interior. The front panels were cracked and the upholstery was worn down.
“I don’t have much,” he said, “but things are way, way better for me now. The uplift changed everything for me. I know you missed it but… yes, yes, I know I shouldn’t pick up a woman… but I know her. I know her. She’s a… fugitive? Maybe! We don’t know that for sure yet!”
Ailsa looked out the window. The car sped over dark hills. Things moved down there. She spied homes, but there was no light.
“Are we crossing protectorate borders?” she asked.
“I said, we don’t yet— Oh shit.” He turned to her. “Lizzy, are you a fugitive?”
Ailsa stared at him blankly. I probably am. “I don’t know,” she said. “Why do you ask?”
Milton turned the back of his head to her and tapped the nape of his neck. A tiny metal box protruded. “Protecty Central says someone matching your description is wanted. Do you know anything about this?”
Her eyes widened and she stared at the box. “No,” she whispered. “What’s Protecty Central and what’s that box?”
Milton laughed. “Oh, it’s nothing, just a thing they gave me in uplift. I sent them your picture so they can see if it’s you.”
“What do you mean, you ‘sent them my picture’?” Ailsa asked. “Why don’t you let me out in the central district?”
“I… no, Lizzy. I love you,” he said. “I want to be a good citizen of Protectorate 13491. Yes, I agreed to the terms. No, I do not wish to be in breach. Goddamnit.” Milton shook his head. He clawed at the metal box at the back of his neck.
The car careened to the right and descended rapidly.
“Milton!” she yelled. “Stop!” She grabbed the wheel and righted the car but the decent continued. “Pull up! Pull up!”
Milton groaned. He got two fingers on the box and pulled. “Why won’t you… come out, goddamnit!”
The car dived left. The golden arches of a Taco McDonalds invaded her view through the windshield.
Milton twisted the box. It came out. He laughed. “I got it! I’m free!”
He passed out.
50
Ailsa dragged Milton’s unconscious body out of the remains of the car. His foot was wedged under his door.
Hamburger buns flew over their heads and razor sharp chopping blades cut nonexistent tomatoes against the stained cement. Ketchup spewed out of a tube in spurts at high pressure like a severed artery.
She dislodged his foot. She dragged him through a puddle of ketchup and over the counter where an ordering kiosk repeated, “Can I take your order?”
Ailsa stopped and stared a moment. I remember this. I don’t remember being here but I remember this place. A dollop of ketchup landed on her face from a pressurized tube. She licked it. Why does that taste so good?
She pulled Milton’s ketchup-soaked body out of the remains of the restaurant and into the parking lot. Cars raced off around her at high speed. A crowd gathered to view the carnage.
A woman screamed. “He’s dead, oh my God, all that blood!” She fainted and hit the ground head-first.
Ailsa looked up. “It’s just ketchup,” she whispered.
She stepped back in and found a cache of water bottles. She grabbed as many of the icy containers as she could. Outside, she dumped them one by one on Milton.
She kneeled down next to him. “Wake up, Milton!” She shook him. His head flopped from side to side.
A Guardian aircar hovered above them.
51
“Papers, please,” said the Guardian. He was the same height as all of them, medium build and well-muscled. His white suit glimmered from the reflections of the fire. His identical partner paced the edges of the crowd.
Ailsa searched for the least dangerous way to reveal her complete lack of papers.
“How long has it been on fire, citizen?” asked the Guardian.
“It… just started,” said Ailsa. She turned to go.
“Papers, please!” said the Guardian in a severe tone of voice. “Citizen, stop.”
Ailsa kept walking.
“Citizen, stop,” said both Guardians at once.
Ailsa broke into a run. There was a brown gate at the back of the Taco McDonalds. She made for it.
A sharp pop sounded and Ailsa hit the ground hard. Her left calf burned.
Milton opened his eyes. He stood up. “Lizzy? Lizzy!”
“Milton,” she yelled. She looked back at him as he rose from the ground.
The Guardian bore down on Ailsa and Milton limped after him.
“Please don’t kill me,” Ailsa whispered to the Guardian.
The pearly figure stopped a meter from her. “You have missed your uplift appointment, citizen. I will now take you to Protecty Central for uplift. I will not hurt you. This is a voluntary procedure.”
“I don’t want to go!” Ailsa yelled.
“This is entirely voluntary,” it said. “You agreed to these terms—”
Milton got behind the Guardian and ripped off its helmet. The head underneath was all wires, shiny metal and iridescent circles.
“Run!” Ailsa yelled.
The grotesque head rotated. The body followed. It grabbed Milton’s head and twisted. Milton’s dead body thudded to the ground.
The machine turned back to her.
Ailsa screamed.
52
The machine-Guardian fell on her. Ailsa kicked and screamed and scratched but it was too heavy.
It’s going to kill me now. The weight of the machine bore down on her chest. Ailsa struggled to breathe.
I want to see it. I want to see the end. She gritted her teeth. She opened her eyes.
A weapon discharged. She trembled. The machine lay motionless next to her. A dark figure stood over her, blocking out the streetlight.
She squinted her eyes.
“Get up,” he said.
She grabbed his outstretched hand and pulled herself up.
He was tall, dark and with a creeping midsection. He looked familiar. Ailsa searched her memory.
He smiled. He was missing teeth. Others were black. Large, dark purple bags pulled at his eyes.
She took a step back. “Who are you?”
He was silent a moment. ”It’s me, Gabriel,” he said.
53
“Where did you go?” Ailsa asked Gabriel. “You abandoned me!” She pounded his nearest shoulder with both fists.
Below, the city was alive with light and fire. They passed through a low, dark cloud.
She tired of hitting him. “Do you have one of those metal boxes in the back of your head, too?”
“What?” he asked.
“I saw someone, from my old protectorate. They put a box in his head during uplift.” She grabbed the hair at the nape of his neck and pulled.
“Ow!” he yelled. The car jerked to the right.
She rubbed her hand all over the back of his head. It was greasy. A stale smell released into the air. But there was no box.
She wiped her hand on the seatback. “Okay, you’re clear. Why—”
“I was scared.” He turned to look at her. “I’m sorry. They sent a dozen big ships in for Texa.”
The sound of her name made Ailsa go rubbery. She hunched forward. She wanted to cry but she just felt empty and exhausted.
“You look different.” She turned to study him. “You look like you got beat up.”
Gabriel shrugged.
“And the man with the box in his head, he looked better than I remember. Am I going insane?”
Gabriel reached a hand over to caress her face.
She slapped it away. “You abandoned me!” she screamed. “Set the car down! I can’t trust you. Everything is screwed up!”
“Relax!” Gabriel descended the car. They passed through thicker and darker clouds. The smell of burning plastic entered the car.
“What’s burning?” she asked.
“It’s the city,” he said. “Just look at it. It’s on fire. The Republic has called an uplift. We’re rising.”
Gabriel leveled off the car. She looked out into the street below. People carried fire and they were burning buildings.
It’s Texa. The thought flashed through her mind. “Texa’s doing this,” she said. “She made me see Milton as ugly because he is ugly inside. She made me see you as handsome because you are good. And now…”
Gabriel turned and smiled. “But I am handsome.”
“Did you see that the Guardians are machines now?” she asked.
“What! That’s not true. I have a friend—” he started.
She giggled and her shoulders relaxed. “I know what’s happening. I know how to get Texa back and how we can be free. I know what to do.”
He studied her face. “You’ve taken Jubitol.”
She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. She focused on Texa’s face. It came to her in a flash.
“I knew it. Of course!” she yelled. “We have to go to XLS1.”
Gabriel turned to her, his eyes big. “XLS1? Not with me, you’re not. Forget it!”
54
“Enter,” said Dr. Vernor Xemura in a whisper. He sat behind a polished metal desk. On the other side of the floor-to-ceiling windows behind him, flames from multiple buildings licked the sky.
A rotund, stooped man in a bursting tuxedo waddled into Dr. Xemura’s office. “What the hell is this, Vernor? Unrest, yes. A little terrorism, if we must. Clean out some protectorates, yes, dear God. But burn the city? Everyone is blaming me!”
Vernor grimaced. “Relax, Alexander. I’ve—”
“I have called an emergency meeting of the trustees for tonight. They’re going to find out about all this.” Alexander pulled a handkerchief from his front pocket and mopped his neck.
“Where are your guards?” Vernor asked with a sly grin. “We need to keep you safe, Mr. President.”
Alexander glared at him. “Safe from what? The Rising? Please. You’re the only threat that concerns me!”
Vernor stood up and looked out the window. His gaze fell on the fires and his heart warmed. The sickly artificial smell of burning plastic at once raced his heart and lightened his head. He turned around. “A little creative destruction will do us good. The rabble will burn up their own protectorates and we simply re-prioritize the cleaning list.” The corners of his mouth and his eyes creased.
Alexander glared at him. “More cleaning? What about when it reaches our neighborhoods? Do we clean them, too?”
“If need be,” said Vernor. He turned around and tensed his jaw muscles. “I tire,” he said in a louder voice, “of your questions. We must order the Republic perfectly. You know what is coming.”
“But, is this really—” started Alexander.
Vernor held up his hand. “The trustees dither and you question. But I do! I am the only one preparing us for the inevitable.” He sat down at his desk and took a yellow pill from a glass bowl. “If not for me, for my efforts, my experiments… my resolution and strength, the Republic would be dead already.”
55
Gabriel touched his ear. “Who is this?”
“Gabriel?” a woman asked. The voice was familiar but it raised a tension in his gut.
Gabriel scowled. “I’m not—”
“It’s Zora.”
Gabriel took a deep breath. He looked through the windshield. Ailsa waited for her order to come up at the food truck.
“What have you done with Texa?” he asked.
“This has a simple solution,” she said. “I don’t know why the Rising didn’t think of this before. Didn’t you tell them you’re his brother?”
Gabriel pursed his lips.
“You marry me, I kill your brother and we take over his holdings, including his trusteeship. Ailsa and Texa go on their merry way. Well, at least Ailsa.”
“What?”
“You heard me. I’m telling it to you straight,” she said. “I checked with the Committee. You are in his will. You get everything. It’s a matter of personal survival now, anyway.”
“I don’t know if you noticed, Zora, but I am interested in Ailsa. I’m not interested in you. And it looks like you helped kidnap Texa again,“ he said. “Where is she?”
“Look, I’m just as much a victim here as she is. I got the devices out of them. It’s not my fault that soldiers showed up and took her. They took me, too!”
“I’m not—” Gabriel started.
“I’m a prisoner here, too!” she yelled.
“Then how come you get to make a phone call?”
Zora was silent a moment. “Look, how much do you know about her?”
“Enough. They need me.”
“She whores herself out.”
“Go smoke yourself,” he said.
Zora sighed. “I’ll nutshell it for you, Gabriel. Your brother engineered them to—”
“What are you saying? He created them? They’re clones? What?” he asked.
Zora sighed. “You know, it’s not that important right now. Here’s the important part. Vernor is engaged in a power play. He is trying to take over the Republic. He is using Texa’s mental powers to do this. If we can kill him—”
“You want to kill my brother. Do you hear yourself?”
Ailsa left the food truck with their food in hand.
“With us, she can have a normal childhood. But for Vernor she is a lab rat, a tool, a weapon.” Zora paused. “Listen, Gabriel, I know about your—”
Gabriel hung up. Ailsa got into the back seat and handed him his half of the food.
“I got your favorite,” she said. “Kung Pao Soy, right?” She smiled at him.
Gabriel stared out the windshield.
“What’s happened?” she asked. “Did somebody call? What?”
“No. No, it’s nothing. Just hungry,” he said with a tired smile. What the hell do I do now?
56
“I just can’t,” said Ailsa. “I can’t eat anything.”
“Aren’t you hungry?” asked Gabriel. They sat high above the city in the black taxi and watched the fires rage below. XLS1 was straight ahead and just below them.
“I am so hungry, Gabriel, but… my whole body hurts. It’s Texa. They’re hurting her. I just know it.”
“We can’t just go in there,” he said. “All we have is this half-drained Gard rifle. We won’t make it past the front door.”
She dropped her Chinese food and hung her head forward. “Give me an idea. You must have one. What’s going to happen? What should I do?”
“I just—” he started.
“How have you avoided the Gards all this time? You know how to use a gun. You’re his brother. There has to be something you can do…” Ailsa frowned and looked away from him.
“I’ve got nothing,” he said. “I’m sorry. Yeah
, he’s my brother but we haven’t—”
“Just shut up,” Ailsa said. “I’ll take care of this. Give me the gun and drop me at the front door.”
“You are insane,” Gabriel said. He opened the glove compartment and pulled the gun out.
“No,” she said. “I’m a mother.”
57
“I don’t want you to feel that I’m—” started Gabriel. He set the taxi down in the street in front of XLS1.
He turned to face her.
“How much is the fare?” Ailsa asked.
“Oh, go bloody smoke yourself,” he said. “I have taken a lot—”
Ailsa got out and slammed the door on him. He rolled down his window.
“Now, just hold on a second…”
Ailsa didn’t hear him anymore. She held the gun at the small of her back and strode towards the entrance.
I’m going in there, I’m going to kill anyone who gets in my way, I’m coming out with Texa and then we’re getting out of here. I can do it. I have to.
A robotic arm zoomed in on her from above the front door. At the end of it was a translucent black ball. “What is your business here, citizen?” it asked.
Ailsa brought out the gun and fired at it. She missed.
A red light flashed above the arm. “Hostile intent detected. Stop and present identification, citizen,” it said.
She fired and missed again. “Damned thing!”
A loud metallic sound came from the front doors. “Lockdown protocol enabled.” The voice came from inside XLS1.
“Subject identified as research asset 1176892-CS32,” said the arm. ”Lockdown disabled manually.”
She held the gun right under the black ball and fired it. A piece of it disappeared and the ball crashed to the ground next to her.
She stepped forward. The glass doors slid open.
58
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