Perion Synthetics

by Verastiqui, Daniel

  Just imagining the destruction of Vinestead, of Sedivy’s battered face and missing teeth, had been enough to send Sava over the edge, gripping the sheets and biting her lip to keep from waking Chuck.

  “The things you think about in the moments before death,” said Anela.

  Gil’s arm slipped around the front of Sava’s throat.

  “Gil,” she rasped, before her airway tightened.

  “Like a fucking dog,” he replied, his voice a lifeless monotone. He pushed her to the ground and straddled her stomach. His fingers sought out her throat again. “You had me killed like a fucking Shore Dog in the street. And for what, Kessler? On whose fucking order?”

  Sava slapped at his arms. “Not mine,” she cried.

  “Then who? James Perion? Why does he want me dead?”

  The room grew dim, blended with the perpetual construct that existed on the other side of reality.

  “Not dead. In his debt.”

  “I’m in no one’s debt.”

  “You are now,” she replied, digging her fingernails into Gil’s synthetic flesh. “But you don’t have to be…”

  Gil squeezed harder, evoking a string of popping noises from Sava’s neck.

  The construct rushed in to fill the void left by the crumbling of reality.

  55

  “The most efficient way to exploit a person is through their desires,” said Anela. She had lost her body somewhere along the line and was now just a voice whispering in the construct. “People will give up their money and their lives to satisfy a desire, so all you have to do is figure out what they want most. Offer it to them, even if you cannot give it to them. The promise of satisfaction will be enough motivation. But remember this, Kai. At all times, consider how helping someone will help you.”

  The construct collapsed under the glare of track lighting in the ceiling of the copy room. Sava felt pain in her throat as she drew one labored breath after the other, coughing when she could afford the oxygen. All at once, awareness of her body flooded back; each limb belted out its own part in her private symphony of pain. She drew them together into a fetal position, held until the throbbing became too much, and released.

  “I’m listening,” said Gil.

  He was sitting in one of the few chairs they hadn’t overturned, one leg crossed over the other and a hand on a nearby prep table. The needler spun in a tight circle under his fingers.

  Sava touched her hip where the weapon should have been and sighed.

  “Clean slate,” she said, struggling to get the words out. “You leave Perion City and we call it even.”

  “But it wouldn’t be even, would it, Ms. Kessler? You had me killed, and you say James Perion ordered it. You didn’t think I’d take offense to that?”

  Sava shook her head on the carpet. “You’re an aggregator, Mr. Reyes. You were working for Benny Coker when you were supposed to be working for Perion Synthetics. Who’s supposed to be offended here? You lied to us, you compromised the security of the company, and you leaked secrets about Perion’s illness and caused a massive devaluation of the company’s shares in a single day. Billions of dollars, Gil. You must have seen people killed for a tiny fraction of that in Margate.”

  “I was just doing my job.”

  “So was I,” said Sava, tapping the carpet with her back of her head. “We were both doing our jobs and things got out of hand, but we don’t have to keep fighting forever. If you want to, you can walk out of here with no debts, no obligations. I’ll convince Perion to let you live out the rest of your aggregator existence in peace.”

  “Right. And the second I step across the PNR, problem solved. Then it’s suicide instead of homicide and you can sleep a little easier at night.”

  Sava thought of the kill order she had given to Ferko and Espinoza. They weren’t the brightest in the city, but they’d follow orders. They would unload on anything that got too close.

  “There is no PNR anymore. In exchange for your freedom, you’ll agree never to reveal that information. You keep our secret, and we’ll keep yours.”

  The needler came to a stop. Gil grabbed it and set it down in his lap.

  “I think I’ll go with my original plan,” said Gil.

  “Jackie. I can give you Jackie back.”

  He shook the needler in Sava’s direction. “Now that’s low.”

  “She’s been damaged, but we can repair her. Ms. Dulac’s imprint is still on file. We can reload her from scratch, make her the woman she was before—”

  “Before she left me? Before she killed me?”

  Sava looked away to the wall. Closing her eyes, she tried to summon the construct and her sister, but nothing appeared. She was alone.

  “She would have no memory of that. Dr. Bhenderu could make her as docile as you want—the perfect companion.”

  “Two synthetics living synthetic lives having synthetic sex and synthetic babies… it’s all bullshit, Kessler. Gilbert Reyes is dead. Jacqueline Dulac is dead. Why simulate what their lives might have been like?”

  “That’s up to you,” said Sava. “The fact remains you’re a synthetic. If you don’t like it, put that needler in your mouth and pull the trigger. Otherwise, I’m offering you a clean slate and the woman of your dreams.”

  Gil stood and pushed the chair away with his foot. “I don’t need shit from you.”

  “No?” asked Sava, using her arm to sit up. “What was your game plan, Gil? How did you think we were going to react when you started feeding your interactions with Roberta? You made Perion look like a goddamn mad scientist.”

  “He is. He brought Jackie back to life like he’s some kind of god!”

  Sava pulled her legs into her body. “Yes, but only because he was trying to preserve his own life. The advances he made with Roberta allowed him to live on when his original body died. And if it hadn’t been for Roberta pushing that envelope, you wouldn’t be standing here now.”

  “If you hadn’t killed me, I would be home by now,” said Gil, taking a step forward. “I’d be in a corner suite in Atlantic City with all the alcohol and women I could handle courtesy of Benny Coker. I would have been set for life, but that’s gone now. All I want is my old life back, Ms. Kessler, and you can’t give that to me.”

  Sava sighed. “You can’t go back, but I’m offering to help ease the pain of your transition.”

  “You’re bargaining for your life,” said Gil, raising the needler for a few seconds and then lowering it again. “You’re promising whatever you have to promise to keep me from ending you. And all of this from Perion’s head of PR, a woman who has demonstrated her ability to kill if her boss orders it. To kill, Ms. Kessler. Do you understand how fucked up that is?”

  “For a flack, perhaps,” said Anela.

  Sava turned to the side and shut her eyes. The construct assembled around her.

  Anela sat in a high-backed leather chair behind an obsidian desk, as she had in the last photo Sava ever saw of her. The blood red dress flared in the dark construct.

  “It might be time to tell him,” she continued, folding her hands. “Even if it wins him over, you can always kill him later.”

  Sava let out a grunt as she stood up. Gil retreated while training the needler on her face.

  “Relax. The floor’s uncomfortable.” She grabbed a nearby chair and set it upright next to a desk.

  If anything, Gil became more agitated, alternating between pointing the gun at her and letting it tremble by his hip. If she lived to tell about it, Dr. Bhenderu would want to hear about nervous behavior in a synthetic.

  “I’m not your enemy,” said Sava, putting her hands on the table as she had seen her sister do. “You’re a prototype of Perion’s most advanced synthetic ever. The only people who want you more than us is Vinestead International—may they burn in hell. How long do you think you’ll last out there, Gil? On your own? Without our protection?”

  “Let them come,” said Gil. “I’ll put every last one of them in the dirt.”


  “In the beginning, I have no doubt. But they’ll keep sending more and more men to hunt you down. Local police, PMCs—even the U.S. military might get involved. They’ll find you, they’ll take you, and they’ll open you up.”

  “Unless I stay here, is that it?”

  “No,” said Sava, smiling. “You can’t stay here. James Perion wouldn’t allow it after all the trouble you’ve caused. My goal is to get you out of the city as soon as possible, so long as you’re willing to cooperate.”

  “And if I don’t?”

  Sava scratched the side of her neck and then drew her finger across it in a slicing motion. When Gil stepped forward with the needler raised, Sava put up a hand. “But it doesn’t have to be that way. Perion can’t protect you on the outside, but I know people who can.”

  Gil shook his head. “Right. You said it yourself, they’ll hunt me down. No one can stand in their way.” He looked away for a moment as the synthetic synapses in his brain began to kludge.

  At this, Anela Zabora clapped her hands softly. Five slivers of light shimmered in the dark ether behind her. From these gashes stepped five black-clad wisps of men; they split ranks to her right and left. Joining them from the periphery were thick bodyguards in gunmetal suits who were as big as the ciphers were small. Their augmented hands gleamed.

  Sava thought about how much she could accomplish, even with such a small team.

  “I’ll put you with Calle Cinco. Los Angeles, Sacramento, Seattle—you name the place.”

  “You have pull with Calle Cinco? Bullshit. Crazy Kai wouldn’t let you within a thousand yards of one of her dens.”

  Sava slapped the desk with an open palm. “Don’t call me crazy!” She glanced at the needler and looked away. “I’ve made some mistakes, yes, but they were all with good intentions. Bringing down Vinestead is more important than you or me. If I have to sacrifice a hundred or a million lives to see it done, I’ll do it. I don’t care how shitty that makes me look in the eyes of Margate’s judgmental and clueless.”

  Gil’s eyebrows furrowed. “You’re Kaili Zabora? You’re the woman who killed seven thousand people in one day?”

  “Seven thousand fifty-seven. And yes, I’m Kaili Zabora, the most feared woman on the west coast and the craziest bitch to ever walk the earth.” Sava waved her hand around dismissively.

  “What the hell are you doing here?”

  She narrowed her eyes. “I’m here because David and Goliath is a fucking myth. A mouse can’t take down a lion; you need another lion. Perion Synthetics has the size, the power, and the money to put an end to Vinestead once and for all. They will win that fight, and I’m here to make sure that fight happens. That means keeping Perion Synthetics out of trouble and off the feeds. That means getting muckraking aggregators like you to shut their fucking mouths.”

  “So,” said Gil. “You’re offering me sanctuary for silence?”

  Sava stood and immediately put a hand down on the desk to steady herself. When the dizziness cleared, she adjusted her clothes.

  “No, Mr. Reyes. I’m offering you a job. You’ve caused nothing but trouble here, and that’s bad for Perion. But I’m in the business of trouble. I’m offering you a chance to use your talents for more constructive pursuits.”

  The collar of her blouse had lost its shape and one of the top buttons had come off. She did her best to make it look presentable.

  “Think about it,” she said, turning and starting for the door.

  “Wait,” said Gil.

  Sava stopped in the doorway but didn’t look back. “I’ve wasted enough time with you already, Mr. Reyes. There are things that need doing, things bigger than you not seeing the upside of a synthetic life. I’ve laid out the options; the rest is up to you. You want a life with your girlfriend? Fine. You want to join Calle Cinco and help us take down the ‘Stead? Great. If not, shoot me in the fucking back. I really don’t give a shit anymore.”

  She left him standing there in the copy room. As she marched down the hall, she prepared herself for the first of the shards.

  They never came.

  56

  Sava headed down to Medical on B5 to see if the synthetics had retrieved Cyn and to get someone to look at the growing bruises on her neck.

  She had stared at the red and purple splotches in the fractured glass of the elevator as it descended, idly wondering how long they would take to heal. It wasn’t proper for someone in her role to show up for work with bruises and cuts from some illegal fight club operating in the back alleys of Perion City. She had an image to live up to and a reputation to protect, but there wasn’t enough concealer in California to cover the blemishes stretching from her jaw to her collarbone. Looking at herself in the mirror, she sneered at the temporary tattoo Gil had given her.

  Unless it wasn’t temporary. Unless it was a permanent badge of honor.

  Someday she would sit around a table in some dingy neon club and talk about her time in Perion City, how human and synthetic alike had swallowed her story of being some Berkeley grad with a passion for building relationships with the public through contemporary and emerging media. She would talk about how she went deeper than any member of Calle Cinco had gone before, slipping into her contrived persona like one of Anela’s form-fitting dresses. There were lessons to be learned from her experience, from long-term social engineering to tolerating sleeping next to a brilliant yet socially inept man whose nighttime snoring was only exceeded by his nighttime flatulence.

  The elevator jolted to a stop on B5, sending a searing pain down the left side of her neck. Sava put a hand on the railing to steady herself.

  Fucking synthetic Shore Dog.

  “You will have to kill him if he chooses not to play ball,” said Anela.

  Sava did her best to nod and left her sister standing in the elevator.

  Gurneys flew past Sava as she navigated the hallways; they were pushed through the crowd with effortless precision by smocked synthetics. She passed the ER entrance, which opened into an underground garage where ambulances lined up to unload their cargo. Unlike the emergency rooms Sava had seen in the movies, this one was relatively quiet, save the moans and cries of the injured humans. The synthetic nurses spoke only in whispers, just loud enough to be heard by the headsets they wore over their ears. They went about their tasks with no emotional involvement, breaking the illusion of empathy.

  Something tightened in Sava’s stomach. Maybe repurposing every synthetic in the city for a manhunt hadn’t been such a good idea. She imagined the scene would be the same at the other clinics in the city—innocent little engineers bloodied and bruised because of her actions. Sava touched her lip; a fingertip came away with a spot of crimson on it.

  “Everyone pays a price,” said Anela.

  And besides, Perion himself had signed off on the idea. Granted, she had played up the story of Gantz shooting him in the head, thus proving the chief of police had gone rogue and was now treating Perion City like his private run-and-gun theater where anyone not on his side was an enemy to be dispatched. Perion had trusted her and allowed her to take charge. She wondered how he would feel once he saw the aftermath.

  “Do you require medical assistance, Ms. Kessler?” asked a synny nurse who had paused to pick up a fallen palette. Her eyes inventoried Sava’s injuries.

  “I’m looking for a female patient,” she replied. “Gunshot wound, maybe multiple.”

  The nurse’s lips moved silently as her eyes drifted towards her earpiece. “We admitted a female with a single gunshot wound twenty-three minutes ago. Doctor Parris was able to stabilize her and the patient is now recovering.”

  “Where?”

  “She is in the atrium. We have set up temporary beds during this emergency. Would you like me to show you the way?”

  Sava shook her head.

  “Please let us know when we can examine your injuries,” said the nurse. She turned and hurried away.

  Sava followed the flow of traffic down the hall for a few hun
dred feet. As with most of the sub-levels in the Spire, being underground meant not being constrained by the circular perimeter of the Spire’s design. Medical stretched out towards the west, opening into a large atrium whose ceiling extended up another floor, just missing the outer edge of the real B4 by twenty feet. Usually, it was a place of relaxation, an expansive room with more potted plants than people. Today, light blue cots set in perfectly aligned rows occupied most of the real estate. Synnies walked the aisles between the cots, checking on the patients.

  Cyn was in a bed near the tree in the center of the atrium, a bright white bandage wrapped around her shoulder. Beside her, a synthetic adjusted the drip from her IV. While standing, Cyn had the body language of someone looking for a fight, but reclining in a cot with a bottle of water in her hand, she had lost much of her intensity. Though, Sava wasn’t stupid enough to think the smile on her face had to do with anything other than the drugs entering through the pinprick in her elbow.

  “Well, if it isn’t the Great Emancipator,” said Sava, stopping at the foot of Cyn’s cot. “Lincoln would be proud.”

  The aggregator’s eyes fluttered and locked in. Her smile widened as she lifted her head slightly.

  “Fuck you, Kessler.” Cyn let her head fall back into the pillow. “Come to finish me off?”

  A shudder went through Sava’s body as she imagined the physical exertion it would require to kill Cyn. Whether or not it was necessary, or even desired, her muscles weren’t going to have any part in it. Being awake for twenty-four hours was hard enough, but the immense stress and physical injuries had pushed her to the very limit of operational status. Her eyes sought out an empty cot in the atrium; perhaps she could grab a few hours of sleep while she waited for dawn. Everything would be better then.

  “No,” said Sava, sitting down on the edge of the cot. She couldn’t stop herself from surveying the crowd again. “There’s been enough killing.”

  “Fat lot of good that does Gantz,” said Cyn.

  Sava let her head drop and winced at the needles in her neck. “Forget about Gantz. You’re free to go. We can’t keep you here, and frankly I don’t want you here, so whenever you feel up to it, you’re welcome to crawl back to your hole in Umbra.”