by Dan Marshall
A crowd had gathered around the shop, its eyes aimed at the screens. Adam silently considered the communal response to tragedy, that people were standing together even as they separately processed what had happened, to be the one good thing to come from bad events. Adam chose one of the feeds to watch, a screen containing the overly painted face of a blonde talking head. The precise movements of her lips implied well-spoken words, but Adam had to be satisfied with reading the captioned text, as the audio could not pass through the thick window of the shop.
“We have been able to confirm Tim Montery’s body was found in a suite at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel,” the text under the woman’s grave face read. “We’re still attempting to get answers about who else may have been in the room. For now, Metra Corp appears to be in the hands of Cora Slate, though initial reports indicated there was a second victim in the room, originally identified as Miss Slate. A spokeswoman for the Central Provisional Authority denies Montery or Slate was in the room. We’ll have more updates as this story develops.”
As the crowd murmured, Adam felt none of the shock he would expect to feel upon surprising news. Montery was dead. Slate too. He wasn’t sure how he knew, but there wasn’t a shred of doubt in his mind. The pain in his back strengthened, reinserting itself into his consciousness as a blast of light blinded him. Adam staggered back and sunk to his knees. Half of the crowd turned to look at him, the other half still lost in the dim glow of the screens as everything faded to black.
Adam’s vision was set forward, off into the distance. Everything was clear, though he was not focused on any one thing in particular. Unlike before, he had no sense of autonomy, but was instead propelled, inch by inch, along a predetermined path. He progressed down the immaculately appointed hallway, willing himself to stop, only to be answered by the continued sound of his footsteps.
An armed man stood outside an ornate door, guarding its woodwork with his stone face and sidearm. As he gave Adam a knowing nod and opened the door, it dawned on Adam that the man was guarding what was behind the door, not the door itself. Adam’s feet carried him through the open door and into the room beyond. He could see two figures asleep under white sheets, creating a rhythmic rise and fall as they breathed.
The man was on his back, the woman on her side, her right arm draped over the man’s torso. Adam was shocked to recognize them as Tim Montery and Cora Slate. Soft smiles lingered at the corners of their mouths, exhausted and euphoric. As Adam’s eyes were set forward, he saw motion in his periphery: his right arm was lifting of its own volition, his hand grasping the handle of a knife. Adam, a prisoner behind his own eyes, watched as his arm and hand again moved without being commanded, plunging the knife into the necks and chests of the slumbering forms.
Short cries and protecting hands erupted in a brief eruption of movement. The knife quickly dispatched these, slamming down again and again until the motion ceased. Blood ran and pooled everywhere: on Adam’s hands and arms—he could taste it in his mouth. Blood spread on the white sheets and turned them a deep red. The bedroom door opened, and Adam saw the same armed man. The man’s hand motioned and Adam’s feet moved, again without any intent on his part. He tried to speed them up, slow them down, stop them; no matter what Adam tried his feet continued their path of progress, across the room, out the door, around the corner.
Adam snapped back to consciousness, groggy and lightheaded. He opened his eyes to see several people standing over him, their expressions ranging from worried to annoyed. No doubt they thought he was a drug user or a drunk. He struggled to his feet, his head and body crying in protest at the movement.
“Hey look, it’s HIM!” a voice, seemingly disembodied, shouted from somewhere in the crowd. Adam tried to find the voice’s source, but his eyes instead came to rest on one of the vid screens, where the feed displayed his face along with a caption imploring viewers to message the authorities with any information. “Someone message the Blues!” It sounded like the same voice, but Adam didn’t wait around to find out. His feet pushed against the rough pavement, his arms wrenched away from prying hands. He again used the pedestrians to his advantage as the bloodthirsty cries of the crowd faded further away from him with each hurried stride.
Adam needed to make it to a safe place. Aria’s was the only location he could think of which was both close and safe, unless they knew she was involved. He’d have to take the chance. Adam’s head still throbbed with every movement, making it difficult for him to think. He needed a minute to gather his thoughts and figure out the safest way to reach Aria’s, since his face was plastered all over the video nodes. People would be looking for him.
Several bags of trash rested against the wall of an alley to his right. Adam stacked the bags in a way that would shield him from the views of passersby, leaned against the brick wall of the alley, and slid into a seated position behind the trash. He took several long, deep breaths, willed his heart to stop trying to burst from his ribcage, and thought about his very long day full of unexpected surprises. Adam’s ears buzzed; his arm was still tender and bleeding; his bare feet felt both hot from running and stone cold against the cracked cement of the alley.
At this moment, after struggling and losing adrenaline, Adam’s body finally gave out. He was filled with horror as he realized he had murdered two people earlier that day in cold blood. Between his aches, pains, and sorrow-filled sobs, he missed the sound of approaching footsteps until they scraped to a halt directly in front of him.
“Hello, Adam,” said a man’s voice, emitted from a face bathed in shadow. Adam looked up and thought, Too late to run. This is it. I’ll die in this alley. The man leaned down, a ramble-jambler in his hand, the side of his face illuminated by a line of light carried in from the street. Adam had seen the man’s face in his dreams and on the subway. The disheveled old man spoke again: “Come with me, it’s not safe here.”
As the man placed the jambler around his neck, Adam once again fell into unconsciousness.
Adam first became aware not of a painful or blinding light but a dull pressure. He next sensed his own heartbeat, ticking as a metronome he felt obliged to obey, to follow. He noticed his arms hurt, one more than the other. Adam winced as he reached over to feel the wound, sealed in gel that would dissolve as the skin regrew, where Hana had sliced him with the knife. The cut was deeper than he had originally realized.
Adam’s eyes opened and a pattern came into focus, drop ceiling panels reflecting the light in the room. Breathing hurt. His clothes were different, made of soft linen. Memories rushed back to him. Hana had tried to kill him. He remembered her face, stern and emotionless with blade in hand, intent to end his life. Is that what he looked like when he had murdered Cora Slate and Tim Montery? Adam could remember killing them. Not clearly, but well enough to know it was true.
There were footsteps in the hall. Adam considered trying to flee, but there wasn’t any fight left in his body. The door opened, soft light from beyond spilling through in diverging lines, split by a shadow. The man stepped into the room and closed the door. Adam watched him reach over and twist a knob. The light on the ceiling responded with more intensity against the walls, which brought the man’s face into focus.
Adam recognized the eyes from pictures, but nothing else. The ears, lips, nose, and even teeth looked different, but the eyes had the same fire in them he had seen in records and footage. The man looked neat and proper, cleaned up since their first meeting on the subway. The man’s frame was shorter than and not quite as wide as Adam remembered. Then again, Adam reflected, the old man had sported a beard and several more layers of clothing the last time their paths crossed. Adam recognized him: Doctor Pavel Troyka.
“I’m glad you’re awake, Adam,” Troyka said as he sat next to the bed. “There’s a lot to talk about. You’re probably aware Tim Montery and Cora Slate were killed yesterday. Yes, you did it.” Adam flinched when the elder man said this, and tears began to form at the corners of his eyes. Troyka continued, “It wasn’t
anything you could control or stop. In fact, without the low level doses of Cloud I’ve been giving you, you wouldn’t remember any of it.”
“You’ve been giving me drugs?” Adam asked, alarmed. “Why would you do—” He stopped, silenced by Troyka’s raised hand.
“Yes. In your toothpaste, deposited via syringe. It was the only way to dose you every day, or close to it. I’m lucky you have good hygiene, or else I would’ve had a much more difficult time finding a way to get doses of Cloud into your system. It’s been known for awhile that it can interfere with the dome’s ability to get a solid neuron read, but it also counteracts Lightcap’s hold over memories to some degree.” Adam’s mouth gaped open in surprise.
Troyka stopped to take a breath. Adam sensed he would have to be proactive if he wanted to ask questions, since Doctor Troyka was a professor and could easily slip into lecture mode.
Adam interrupted, “I understand, at least to some degree, why Cloud could interfere with the dome and its neuron scanning, but how does that affect the memory component of the Lightcap? Also, why do I only remember some things? And the Lightcap still seems to work and accept commands when I wear it. I’m guessing it does, anyway, or else I’d probably be dead—like Damen.”
Troyka said, “I heard about Damen. I’m sorry I couldn’t do more to help. I gave you very low doses of Cloud, but daily. The amount was minuscule, just enough to undo the trauma on your neural pathways caused by Lightcap.” He shrugged. “It’s, well, sort of complex. I mean the answer to why you remember some things, but not others. To put it plainly, the relationship between Cloud, the dome, and the Lightcap is not well understood.”
“You didn’t make Cloud?” Adam asked, wincing with pain. He had been convinced Pavel would tell him he had developed Cloud as a secret countermeasure to the Mind Drive device he had unleashed on the world.
“Not at all,” Troyka answered. “I wish I had. It’s a novel compound, unlike anything I’ve ever seen in the realm of pharmacology. No one knows exactly why Cloud affects the brain the way it does. There is actually much debate as to whether Cloud was intentionally designed to interfere with the domes, or if it was just a happy accident.” He paused. “Either way, that’s why the Blues have ramped up drug-enforcement actions lately, with a special focus on Cloud. LaMont knows the more Cloud spreads, the more difficult it will be to control the populace with Lightcap.”
Adam again interrupted, “About Lightcap, Doctor Troyka—”
“‘Pavel’, please. We live in dangerous times, my friend. We are in constant peril. There is little need for formality.”
“Sure. Pavel. So, Pavel, about Lightcap. Doctor Velim was light on details. She said the Lightcap takes a snapshot of the brain, and then uses targeted lasers to zap memory clusters before it’s removed, erasing all memory of the time it was worn. At least, that was my understanding. I’m just a coder,” Adam said.
“Ah yes, Sera. I will answer your questions, which will hopefully give you some insight into the behavior and actions of our dear Doctor Velim. First of all, forget everything you’ve been told about Lightcap and how it functions. While Lightcap does have a deleterious effect on memory, it is not as targeted as you were led to believe. I’ll do my best to explain succinctly. When I first developed the Mind Drive, our early testing showed it created a sense of docility in many people, seemingly a side effect of the electrostatic field created by the device. It appeared to cause lowered inhibitions, making the mind more open to suggestion and subliminal input. I was looking for a way to advance our technology,” Pavel said, shaking his head wistfully, “not to control people or make them weak-willed. It took me over a year to find an effective way to counteract that unintended consequence. This was early in the development, decades ago. I tried my best to bury the notes and research about this effect, but there are still a few people alive who remember, and probably a note or datafile somewhere.
“I left Brain Sync because of LaMont. Don’t think this acquisition was recent; there was pressure as far back as fifteen years ago. He sent men to kill me, then got his hands on Sera. Maybe he had even before that. Who knows? At this point, Roman LaMont is probably in control of a significant amount of capital, along with Sera,” said Pavel, his voice betraying anger.
“How is he in control of Sera?” Adam asked, as he slowly lifted himself up to a seated position. His arms and back complained, but it felt good to see the world horizontally again, even as his stomach lurched and threatened to revolt.
Pavel motioned at him and said, “Be careful. You still have drugs in your system. Curanol, which mixes with the gel in your wound to promote faster healing and skin growth. Also makes you a little drowsy and nauseated. LaMont’s in control of her because that’s what the Lightcap does. It’s the fully realized potential of the Mind Drive tech, plus some other vile stuff LaMont’s lab goons came up with. They’re smart, but they have no ethics, no humanity. Just ‘progress’. I don’t know exactly how it works, but I have a guess. I found the one in your pocket. Sorry. Curious mind, you understand. I haven’t had much time to look at it, but the best I can gather is that it significantly amplifies the hypnosis-like effect exhibited by the early builds of the Mind Drive. It doesn’t erase memories so much as it traumatizes the brain into forgetting. The reason you’re remembering the really terrible things first is because most of the time you probably were doing mundane tasks—at least many of you. Sitting in cubicles and throwing code, or whatever you call it these days.
“The device seems to have multiple levels. One makes you very obedient to commands while allowing for higher-level autonomy to carry out those directives. The other end of the spectrum allows for total body control. Wireless command in and out, maybe even some sensory pass-through, allowing the person in control to feel what the receiver is feeling? It’s hard to say without further study. The device you had is only a receiver. I imagine LaMont has the control device. His might be the only one, or there might be multiple. The control unit likely allows the wearer to control any person using a Lightcap that is connected to the mesh.” Adam felt increasing shock and horror turning to outrage with every new word Doctor Troyka spoke.
“I’ve tried to get to Sera,” Pavel continued, “but she’s well protected, as is LaMont. I’ve got someone on the inside. You know him. Dej Singh. Of course, he and Aria are now an item. They weren’t sure if you could be trusted, but I told them I had good a feeling about you. I’m worried about their safety, but they haven’t been dosing with Cloud, so they don’t remember anything. I still don’t like the thought of them being there. We need to bring this to an end and get them out. On the plus side, Aria won’t have to try to pull off that absurd stunt you all planned, thanks to the Lightcap prototype you had when I found you.”
Adam wasted no time, taking the pause as an opportunity to break in. “Yeah, don’t thank me, thank my dead girlfriend. It was hers. I took it from her right after she tried to kill me. Are you telling me she was under control? Directly? Or was she just following an order?”
Pavel shook his head, a look of sadness on his face. “I’m sorry. I’m not entirely certain. I would imagine it depends on conditioning. If you put a Lightcap on a soldier and tell him to kill someone, that’s not going to require direct control. If you order him to kill his own mother, it most likely would. Depends on the soldier, I guess,” he said with a chuckle. Adam didn’t laugh, the memory of blood on his hands much too recent to allow him to appreciate gallows humor. “For an office worker, you could tell them to file papers, or, in your case, debug code, but you would need to take them under direct control if you wanted them to assassinate someone, or something equally out of the ordinary. The human brain is still a mystery in many ways, even with all our advancements, but it seems as if the Lightcap can turn anyone into a mindless drone, remotely controlled. I can’t begin to express the sorrow I feel over these events, how my invention is being perverted and abused,” the old man finished with a sigh.
“But what’
s the point?” Adam asked, his legs now planted against the floor, requiring deep breaths to calm the shock of pain at his vigorous movement. “Control? They’re already in charge of everything. Money? They already have more credits than a man could spend in a lifetime. Why do this?” He was genuinely baffled, his horror aside.
Pavel looked down. Adam almost spoke again after several long seconds with no response. The old man said, “Greed is a curious thing. Some men are content with nothing, while others seem bent toward acquisition beyond measure. We know more about the brain than ever but still know next to nothing, and even less about the human psyche. I’ve often wondered what drives some men to their evil deeds, but there is no understanding madness. It consumes you, becomes you. I have no idea why LaMont is doing these things. I only know he must be stopped.
“Dej and Aria are still on the inside. We’ll need to get them out, and then find someplace safe. We’ll probably have to leave this Region. I have some friends in the United States who can probably find a place for us, somewhere out of LaMont’s reach.”
“Wait,” Adam said, “What about Velim? We have to get her, too. Think about what information she might have, or what might happen to her if we don’t take her with us. There’s no way I’m leaving her under the control of that psychopath LaMont.”
“Adam,” Pavel responded, with a tone that would normally be appropriate for delivering an apology, “I don’t think it’s possible. She’s too well protected. Even if we could get to her, I’m not even sure she’d be able or willing to go. She might be damaged from long-term Lightcap exposure, or may just be on LaMont’s side, after having spent—”