The Roadhouse Chronicles (Book 3): Dead Man's Number

by Cox, Matthew S.

  Abby sat in a metal folding chair at the end of Tris’ workbench near Bee’s shoes, holding a set of handcuffs while working at them with a shim. It took her a while, but she managed to open it. Each time she succeeded, she closed the hasp and did it again. Tris took the liberty of machining up three more shims. Two went in her shoe for safe keeping, and the third clicked and scraped away in Abby’s grasp.

  “You did something good,” said Bee. “I am getting a POST from the primary gyroscope.”

  “Great.” Tris wiped sweat off her forehead.

  “Post?” asked Abby.

  “Means it’s booting up. Power-On Test.”

  “That’s POT.” Abby stuck out her tongue.

  “Self-Test,” said Bee. “Reports functional. Still, I do not appear to have arms or legs.”

  “I’m working on it.” Tris stooped over the android’s back again. “That power spike cooked a couple things I didn’t see before. I’m glad I went shopping.”

  “This settlement possesses a surprising amount of technology given its size.” Bee lifted her head, turned it to peer into the room instead of at the wall, and lowered it. “They have been asking me for advice. I’ve accessed data tables and run computations I never calculated I would use again.”

  Tris removed twelve hex screws holding a hip actuator in place and extricated a flat, donut-shaped, metal ring. It looked fine on the outside, but the circuitry in it had fried. “I’m glad you’ve been involved, not just lying here.” She seated a new one she’d recovered from Omaha and started replacing the screws.

  “I am not susceptible to the same feelings of distress a human might suffer from inability to ambulate. My great grandfather was a desktop computer. They do not move.”

  Tris blinked at her. “Your sense of humor is getting better.”

  “Shit. Tris. Help,” whispered Abby, her voice wavering.

  Tris looked over. The girl had handcuffed herself, and couldn’t get the shim in like she could while merely holding them. She grasped Abby’s hands and maneuvered them around to the proper angle. Abby fiddled at it for a few seconds, rising panic visible on her face. Tris again took her hand and helped her force the lock open.

  Abby sagged against the wall, out of breath. “Uhh, maybe I’m not ready for that yet.”

  “You don’t have to do any of it. No one will be upset with you if you give up. But, the only way to get better at something is to do it over and over. At least you don’t have Randall teaching you.”

  “Who’s that?” Abby bit her lower lip and fiddled with the remaining cuff on her left arm.

  “He’s the guy who forced me to learn how to escape. Even in virtual reality, being dropped face first into a swimming pool while cuffed was not fun.”

  Abby paled.

  Tris frowned. “He called it motivation. It wasn’t real; I was in a simulation.” And apparently simulated reality can cause nightmares. She finished tightening the screws and connected a ribbon cable to the actuator.

  “S-simulation?” Abby glanced down, wincing as the shim slipped and stabbed her in the wrist. “Ow. Shit.”

  “It’s like a dream.” Tris pulled her hair back and tapped the tiny plug behind her left ear. “From a wire.”

  “That’s freaky.” Abby bit her tongue in concentration, wiggled the shim, and the cuff slipped open. Her entire body sagged with a sigh of relief.

  Bee’s foot twitched.

  Abby glanced at the android. “You fixed her hip. Why is her foot moving?”

  “The wiring is in series. The blown actuator blocked everything past it.” Tris pointed. “The cable has power and control signals. It plugs into the ring, which connects to another lead embedded in the ‘bone’ that goes to the rest of the leg.”

  “Oh. That is most excellent.” Bee moved her leg around. “Please fix the other side.”

  Tris grabbed a black box about the size of her fist. “I’m going to replace the secondary capacitor first. I think I figured out why your arms are offline.”

  “Serial connectivity routed through the capacitor. You are correct,” said Bee.

  Abby went back to practicing on the cuffs while holding them. “Can you get out of them if they put your hands behind you?”

  “Yes. As long as I can get hold of a shim. That’s how I was when they threw me in the pool.”

  “How can you escape when you can’t even see them?” Abby blinked.

  “Going by feel. Takes a bit of practice.”

  Abby seemed frightened by the thought, and looked down as she worked. “I don’t want to do that yet.”

  Tris removed the blown-out capacitor and tossed it over her shoulder. “It’s okay. Whatever you want. This was your idea.”

  “Yeah.” She sighed. “I don’t wanna be stuck if the Infected find me.”

  Tris paused working on Bee to squeeze Abby’s shoulder. “I won’t let anyone ever do that to you again.”

  Abby reached up and grasped Tris’ hand, smiling.

  “Hey.” Kevin walked over holding the dead capacitor. “Careful. That almost hit me in the head.”

  “Sorry.” Tris turned to give him a quick hug and kiss before seating the replacement.

  “How’s the patient, Doc?” He leaned forward to peer inside. “Wow. I’m in awe that you can make sense of any of that. There’s so much stuff packed in there.”

  “I think I’ll have her up and running in another few minutes.”

  “That would be wonderful,” said Bee. “I would possess much gratitude.”

  “So…” Kevin threaded his arms around her waist and hovered his chin at the side of her head. “Might as well talk about it before you burst.”

  Tris let her arms slack and hung her head. “I know it’s stupid. It makes no sense at all, but I can’t stop thinking about it.”

  “Your dad… They said he was killed, right?”

  She clung to an ancient memory… herself about six sitting on the floor, surrounded by computer parts and robot bits in his lab. Her father, frazzled grey hair and white labcoat, smiled down at her from his chair. Six years old and she’d made a robotic fish. Not that it could swim, or even really looked like a fish. It came out shaped like a slab, but it bent itself back and forth almost like a fish swimming.

  Dad had reacted as if she’d invented cold fusion.

  Tears ran down her face. “Yeah. I was nine when they came for me… told me he’d died in an accident. I spent a day or two in the hospital being checked out and they assigned me to this couple. Those people completely refused to believe they adopted me. They acted like I was really theirs and I’d made up my father like some kind of invisible friend.” She sighed. “Enclave probably told them to act like he never existed or they’d kill us all. They thought I was ‘disturbed’ and brought me to a psychiatrist.” She frowned at the painful memory, jabbing at a stuck screw in Bee’s back. They really laid on the guilt trip. I almost wanted to believe it hurt them when I said they weren’t my real parents.

  “That sounds painful.” Kevin kissed her ear.

  Abby popped the cuffs, relocked them on nothing, and attempted to open them again with her eyes closed.

  “It’s a mental doctor. I eventually stopped mentioning him because I didn’t want them to think I was crazy. For a little while, I started to wonder if maybe I had made him up, but… I just know. The memories were too real. Too complete.”

  Kevin squeezed her from behind. “Sorry. So… what does your instinct tell you?”

  “My head says this is a stupid idea.” She grunted while trying to force a connector into the capacitor. Six tiny flat metal blades protruding from a plastic housing did not want to slide easily into their corresponding socket. It looked right, but refused to go in. “Shit. Why won’t this go in?”

  Kevin stepped out from behind her and took it from her grip in two fingers, twisting it up to examine it. He glanced between the connector and the socket. “I think that pin second from the top is a little bit wider than the rest. One of t
hose ‘only goes in one way’ deals.”

  “Crap. You’re right.” She rubbed her eyes. “I’ve been staring at circuits for three hours without a break… and I’m…”

  “Distracted? Worried?”

  “Yeah, both.” She twisted the plug around the other way and pushed it home. A little corrosion on the metal blades made it a stiff fit, but it worked.

  Bee emitted a loud beep before convulsing in a spot-on impression of a live salmon someone had tossed on a grill. Abby let out a shriek of startlement, leapt out of her chair, and scurried to a safe distance. Kevin guarded his nuts and took two steps back.

  The fit lasted four seconds before Bee lay still.

  A short trumpet sound effect that suggested ‘ta-da!’ played from her.

  “Power on diagnostic complete. Unit online. Maintenance suggested for… Secondary fuse cluster.” Pause. “Primary memory module.” Pause. “Right shoulder mobility systems.”

  Beep.

  Bee pushed herself up to kneel, twisted about, and sat on the table with her legs dangling. “Gratitude.” She reached out to hug Tris.

  “You’re welcome.” Tris embraced the android. “Okay, lie back down a bit more. You’re still wide open.”

  “Oh. Yes. That is a wise decision.” Bee resumed lying on her front, though she folded her arms under her head.

  “Well, like I said, on a brain level, I think it’s stupid and reckless… but on every other level, I feel like it’s something I have to do. The Enclave said he died, but… I’m not sure I’d believe anything they say.” She opened the back of Bee’s head and poked at a row of green circuit board cards. “Bee… I have to re-seat your primary NVRAM cards. I can’t do that when you’re on. Would you shut down? I promise I’ll turn you back on in like two minutes.”

  “Okay. I trust you.” Bee blinked with a click. “Beginning power down sequence. Volatile memory transfer completed. System shutdown in three… two…”

  Bee stopped moving.

  “You’re not going again?” Abby ran over and grabbed Tris. “What if you get hurt and don’t come back?” She sniffled and started crying. “I don’t wanna be alone.”

  Tris pulled her into a tight hug. I’m so terrified that they’re going to kill everyone here. I can’t just sit around. “Abby… what happened in Amarillo could happen here.”

  Abby stared at her, open-mouthed.

  “I don’t mean to scare you.”

  “Well, you did,” whispered Kevin. He patted Abby on the shoulder. “What she means is, there’s a chance they could do it. Not that they will.”

  “You don’t know that.” Tris bit her lip and growled. “Nathan’s not going through proper channels. He’s been rogue from the start on this and I think it’s taking him a while to find a way to sneak a flight path past the monitors. I… I’m sorry, Abby, I don’t mean to get you worked up over nothing, but I’ve been scared shitless that there’s gonna be a drone coming by.”

  “Is that why you told the militia to watch the skies?” whispered Abby.

  Tris nodded. “If I thought… If I could really believe they’d leave us alone, I’d forget about everything and just stay here and be happy with you and Kevin… This place is perfect.”

  Kevin raised an eyebrow. “Perfect?”

  “Well okay, it’s primitive, but”―she smiled―“simple pleasures can be better than all the fancy stuff.”

  “You don’t miss anything?” Kevin cocked an eyebrow.

  “Well, maybe the medical facilities. I’d say school too, but I don’t trust them.”

  Kevin laughed. “More like movie theater than school.”

  She poked him in the side.

  Abby sniffled. “Can they kill this place like they killed Amarillo?”

  Tris grasped her shoulders and locked eyes. “What they did there, they could probably do anywhere. That’s why I need to check this message out. To at least try to do something about them.”

  “Okay.” Abby clamped on. “I’ll go.”

  “Uhh,” said Kevin.

  Tris shook her head. “No, Abs… I need you to stay here where it’s safe. We’re going to be close to the Enclave. It’s dangerous there.”

  “It’s not”―Abby dropped her yell to a whisper―“safe here. A second ago, you said it’s not safe here. What if they drop that stuff on us?”

  “This place is pretty small,” said Kevin. “Nathan might not know where it is. Amarillo was a big city, easy to see from the air. That, and the militia is watching the skies. ’Rillo didn’t have any advanced warning an attack like that could happen. I don’t know what we could run into out there, but you will definitely be safer here. We’ll also be safer not having to constantly worry about something happening to you.”

  “Wait, you’re going too?” Abby stared at him. “You’re both leaving me?”

  Kevin squeezed Tris’ shoulder. “I made that mistake last time I got a stupid idea. I’m not letting her out of my sight.”

  She shot him a playful annoyed look, tinged with worry and sadness. “Nowhere is really safe anymore. This is about as safe as it gets… I need to know you’re okay.” She glanced at Kevin. “Bee could watch her. Oh shit.” Tris hunched over the android and removed, blew on, and reseated all twelve tiny memory cards along the back of the skull. Once she replaced the last one, she pushed the power button and closed the head.

  Beep.

  “I dunno.” Abby glanced sideways at the android. “What if it like goes nuts and kills me?”

  “Bee’s not going to do that.” Kevin chuckled. “She’s a pretty good cook too.”

  “That was longer than two minutes,” said Bee.

  “Sorry. I got distracted talking. How do you feel?”

  Bee turned her head to look up at Tris, far enough past a normal human range of motion to be creepy. “The difference is noticeable. Processing is more efficient due to fewer cache misses. You are too good to me.” She smiled.

  Tris eased the android’s back panels closed and pulled a purple T-shirt down over them. “Well, that’s about all I can do for now. As good as it gets without a factory rebuild.”

  Bee climbed off the workbench to her feet. “The factories no longer exist, so I will consider this good.”

  “I think she’ll be happier with Bill and Ann,” said Kevin.

  “I’ll be happier with you guys.” Abby folded her arms.

  He ruffled her hair. “I don’t mean permanently. Just for the couple days it’ll take us to go make a… phone call.”

  “I know.” She frowned. “I wanna go with you.”

  Tris took a knee and looked her in the eye. “Abby… I want you to be safe. I’m going out there for a chance to maybe do something about the Enclave. They need to answer for what they did to you. What they did to your dad.”

  “Warren killed him.” Abby glared. “And you already shot him for it.”

  Tris wrapped her arms around the girl. “It’s the Enclave’s fault. It’s Nathan’s fault. If they didn’t drop Virus on Amarillo, you’d still be happy.”

  Whimpering, Abby sniveled, “I can still be happy here. Please don’t go off and die.”

  “I have to.” Why do I have to? This… god dammit, Nathan. He probably uploaded some subliminal crap to make me believe in that bullshit mission to save the world. Make sure I found the resistance and didn’t think too much about what I was doing. “Maybe… something’s wrong.”

  “Like what?” Kevin rubbed her back. “I mean… other than everything.”

  Tris kept clinging to Abby, but stood. “This feeling I have. This drive. It’s not right. It’s almost like a ghost in my head. A personality overlay or something. Maybe Nathan wanted to make sure I swallowed his bullshit about the cure and being the chosen one to save the world so I didn’t ask too many questions.”

  “They can do that?” Kevin blinked.

  She shrugged. “I don’t know. I can’t figure out any other reason why I’m feeling pulled to go take on the Enclave alone.”
>
  “First, you’re not alone. Second, you’re not taking on anything right now but a phone number. We don’t know what we’ll find or even if it’ll work. As of right now, we’re driving into a pretty shitty area hoping to find some working tech. At no point in this plan does ‘taking on the Enclave’ factor in. And…” He put two fingers under Tris’ chin to lift her face. “I think you’ve already got enough mom in you to want to make sure they don’t send a drone this way.”

  Abby sniffled. “I don’t want you to die.”

  “That works.” Kevin nodded. “I don’t want to die either.”

  Tris cringed, feeling like Bee had punched her in the gut. Guilt crashed headlong into the inexplicable drive to go off and crush the Enclave. The ridiculousness of it would’ve made her laugh if not for the odd feeling that she actually could do it. It made zero sense, and she knew she wasn’t half as frightened as any sane, rational person would’ve been in her position.

  Going after the Enclave almost felt like a good idea… except for the look on Abby’s face.

  “Abs. I promise I will be as careful as possible. If things look too insane, we’ll abort and come right back home. We can always find some underground place where they can’t drop on us.”

  “Dallas,” said Kevin. “They wanted us to stay anyway. That place is pretty much clear for Virus anyway. Enough background radiation on the surface to kill it. The whole place is underground.”

  “That sounds awful.” Abby scrunched her nose.

  “We’re not going anywhere yet.” Tris smiled. “I want to plan this. It doesn’t make any sense, but I think this is the right thing to do. Like some external power is telling me that I can do this.”

  “I guess.” Abby stared down at her moccasins. “If you don’t come home, I’m going to be so mad at you.”

  “Well.” Kevin shrugged. “There ya go. We have to come back now.”