Five Days Dead

by James Davis

  “Real world? Thought it wasn’t polite to say the ‘real world?’”

  “Oh, I know. It’s completely improper to differentiate between digital or physical world. Universe and digiverse are the same, they say, but they’re not. Any fool knows that who has a mind to think.”

  “Suppose so.”

  The old man looked at Harley’s dirty and dusty clothes and boots. “You come in from the Wilderness?”

  Harley nodded.

  “What’s it like out there?”

  “Different than here.”

  “Did you see any animals out there? Cows and such?”

  “And such.”

  “Was it bad?”

  “Wasn’t good.”

  The old man looked out the window. “I used to be a veterinarian. It used to be my job to take care of animals, but I gave it up when the Rages hit. I know I could still be a vet, still take care of animals when they get injured in the Wilderness. But I used to love the interaction with them, the love they showed and the love I gave. Now if they’re wounded you have to sedate them, heal them and get them away from you before they come out of anesthesia or they’ll just attack. I just don’t have the heart for it.”

  “What about dogs? There’s still dogs.”

  “Yes.” The old man agreed. “But it’s just too sad. I had to give it up. Even the dogs don’t seem the same,” the old man paused for a time and his dull eyes were far away, to different times and places. Harley let him wander. He looked up after several minutes and smiled. “I know a lot of people who have dogs but they don’t seem like the dogs I remember. They know they’re hunted, just like us, maybe even worse than us. They have been denied by the rest of the animal kingdom and they know it. They’ve lost something because of it.”

  “Price you pay for being man’s best friend.”

  “I suppose.” The old man extended his hand. “My name is Jose Guillermo.”

  Harley looked at his outstretched hand but did not take it. “Harley.”

  “Do you live on one of the reservations? I understand there are still quite a few Native Americans living on the reservations.”

  Harley stared blankly. “No.”

  The commuter flew down the rail and the two travelers were quiet for a time. Harley looked toward the lake at an expansive building that stretched for more than a mile and was perhaps 20 stories tall. There were a number of people coming and going. Pods were zipping in and out of the parking area, dropping some people off, picking others up. Jose saw where Harley was looking.

  “The Provo/Orem Medprint. Just opened a few weeks ago.”

  “Lots of people there.”

  “Well, the Medprint is about the only thing you can’t get delivered nowadays. But I’m sure the day will come when you order whatever parts you need and a medrone arrives at your apartment, performs your surgery on your kitchen table and lets itself out.”

  “You think?”

  “Wouldn’t surprise me in the least. Is that where you’re headed? The Medprint?”

  “Never been.”

  “Never?” Jose looked at him as if he was some oddity that needed closer examination. “You mean you’re all original?”

  Harley shrugged.

  “That’s something. I didn’t think anyone over the age of 25 still had all their original parts.”

  “You?” Harley eyed the old man. He looked original and about worn out.

  “New heart, eyes and lungs.

  “How old are you?”

  “I’ll be 137 next month. I was alive before they cured cancer, high blood pressure and diabetes. Dodged more bullets in my life than most. Nowadays I go for my monthly checkup and quarterly fat removal. Of course, that’s just good body maintenance.”

  “So’s watching what you eat.”

  The commuter silently came to a stop and told Harley he had arrived. He stood up and left the commuter without saying goodbye to Jose Guillermo.

  Outside he paused to take off his eyeset and smoke a cigarette. He could see the Hilton Hotel a half a block down. There were maybe a dozen people in the thoroughfare. A dozen people in sight in an agglomeration of more than 23 million. He tossed his cigarette on the ground and walked toward the hotel. A groundskeeper scurried past him and scooped up the butt before it had stopped smoldering.

  There was no sign of life in the lobby of the hotel and Harley cursed and slipped on his eyeset. He had forgotten. Through his eyeset an attractive young woman with lime green hair was smiling at him seductively and he nodded at her as he approached the lobby desk and requested a room on the top floor.

  He saw nothing living as he climbed on the elevator and ascended to his room. There were a number of fillers roaming the halls and he couldn’t decide what was sadder, to be the equivalent of human wallpaper walking the halls in a digital representation of the Hilton Hotel in Provo, Utah, or to be the only physical person walking the halls of the Hilton Hotel in Provo, Utah.

  His room was expansive and tastefully decorated and he felt out of place as he tossed his backpack, hat and eyeset on the chair by the window and sprawled spread eagle across the king size bed. He nodded off for a moment and when he woke he was hungry. He ordered lunch while he kicked out of his clothes and climbed into the shower to scrub away the dirt and grime.

  After he had eaten he dumped the contents of his pack on the bed and found nothing clean enough to wear, so he slipped back on his eyeset and went shopping. Harley Nearwater did not enjoy shopping in any form, except for weapons. He visited every storefront he could think of, his head beginning to throb from the images dancing through it. The fashions of the day were not in keeping with Harley’s admittedly simple style. Everyone was wearing chameleons it seemed. The cut of the clothing might be different, but the color changed depending on your whims. Harley didn’t have whims. He liked his clothing to pick a color and stick with it and his color of preference was typically black or brown. He wasn’t a peacock and didn’t like looking like one.

  Before he finished shopping he grew frustrated and ordered a case of beer and bottle of whiskey and after indulging in a little of both felt up to finding some new clothes to wear. He eventually went to a flashback shop, where he could find good old fashion dungarees, western shirts and a pair of boots you could actually wear. He bought four pairs of jeans and shirts, new socks, boots and underwear. He looked at his tan Stetson and decided against replacing his hat.

  “It’s not even Christmas.” Harley said when the clothing package arrived at his door. It was a rare indulgence but if he was going to get an audience with the Marshal he had better not look like a derelict.

  Since he had been drinking, he couldn’t pay a visit to the Marshal, but he sure as hell didn’t want to sit in his room on the Link the whole damned day. He gulped two more beers, slipped the whiskey in his back pocket and left the hotel.

  The Link told him there was a park three blocks west and he walked down the sidewalk between sparkling and mostly deserted looking buildings, nodding at the few passersby and being ignored by every one. It was disconcerting not having his sidearm strapped to his waist and more than once he felt his hand reaching to rest on the butt of a blaster that was not there. He was weaponless and probably safer than he had been in some time. But he didn’t feel safer.

  The park was a long expanse of grass and walkways and trails, with trees gently swaying in the soft breeze. There was a playground and volleyball net and park benches with chess sets. The only thing missing was people.

  Harley sat on a concrete bench in an empty park and sipped his whiskey. He took his hat off and sat it beside him and enjoyed the sun on his face. There was no birdsong, but, of course, if there had been birdsong there would have been panicked screaming to accompany it. There was classical music playing softly from speakers tastefully hidden in the trees and Harley enjoyed the sound. He folded his eyeset and put it in his shirt pocket.

  A young couple with two small children and a dog chased each other on the grass a short di
stance away and Harley watched them for some time, amazed at the joy they seemed to be taking from such a simple thing. The dog was a small breed, a poodle or a terrier; he wasn’t sure which because he didn’t really know dogs. He had a dog when he was a boy, but it hadn’t ended well. The dog in the park was a barker and as the children played it yapped and danced around them. Harley found that he liked the sound of the dog barking. Eventually, the family noticed him staring and when he raised an arm in greeting, they walked the other way.

  His face felt tight and he realized he had been smiling, grinning like a lunatic. He wiped the smile away and finished his whiskey. A city teeming with people and he was still all alone.

  He stayed for a little while longer in an empty park designed with people in mind and then he stood, slipped the whiskey in his back pocket, dropped his hat back on his head and went for a walk.

  He eventually found his boots clicking on the cobblestones of Provo Center Street and for the first time since arriving in the Hub he was among humanity. Although the streets were not busy, there were a few pods, green, blue and white ones, zipping up and down the road but no heavy traffic. The sidewalks, however, were teeming with people shuffling back and forth, laughing, talking, some of them holding hands as they visited the old shops and restaurants.

  He found a park bench on a corner and sat down and watched humanity walk by in their brightly colored clothes and their loud laughter and senseless chatter and it comforted him and made him sullen at the same time. What might it be like to be like them, to belong to something the way they seemed to belong to each other? He didn’t have a clue. He was a spectator in their world.

  On the next corner was a magnificent old building raising a steeple to the heavens and as night slowly descended on the Hub the temple glowed. Couples came and went through the high walls surrounding the building and Harley found himself marveling at the faithful. There were still believers in the world. He didn’t have a clue what Mormons believed, but found it unusual that any religion could survive in the New Age of Discovery. The world ground faith into dust but somehow the faithful held on. Freedom of religion was a right to life in the Federation, but it was a right people just didn’t seem to get all that worked up about anymore. Some of the world’s religions had chosen to go neand and were dwindling down to nothing while others tried to build a presence in the digiverse. After the Energy Wars and the Muslim / Christian massacres that came with it, the Federation classified all religions as cults and paid them little mind in the affairs of man. For Harley, it felt right that there were people out there who still believed in something bigger than the Federation.

  When night settled in he went in search of food and followed a group of young people chatting enthusiastically about some nonsense they were living on the Link as they crowded into an old Mexican restaurant. They were all thin and wispy with very little in the way of muscle definition in their arms or legs, shoulders or abdomens. They looked like clay people and he wondered if they didn’t go for fat removal for a year would they be able to walk at all? He didn’t think so.

  As he waited for the crowd in front of him to be seated he smiled softly at the noise level in the restaurant. There was music playing and people were laughing and talking and the aroma of grilling meat floated in the breeze created by large overhead fans. A sign at the entrance proclaimed in brightly lit letters “Welcome to Su Casa Realtime Mexican Grill.”

  A pale young man in the group ahead finally took notice of him and nudged his friends. They all burst into a fit of laughter as they adjusted their chameleon clothes to try and match his jeans and western shirt.

  “What do you think; do we have your look down Mr. Wild West?” The pale boy asked.

  “Not quite.” Harley took his whiskey bottle out of his back pocket and took a sip.

  “What are we missing? Oh, the hat. We haven’t got a hat.”

  “The hat.” Harley took one small step toward the group. “And a few scars.”

  The group turned around and didn’t look back until seated. When it was his turn the host, a true, blue, living, breathing person in a chameleon dialed to look bright and festive and vaguely Mexican smiled at him with only his lips.

  “What kind of meat do you serve here?” Harley asked.

  “Beef, Chicken, Pork.”

  “Figured as much. But how is it raised. Is it real?”

  “All of our meat is the highest quality.”

  Harley sighed. “Not what I asked. Has any of the meat you serve here ever had legs? Or a hide? Or a head?”

  The host just stared.

  Harley tried again. “Is the meat butchered, or was it printed somewhere?”

  “Herriman Brothers Meats provides all of our meat from only the highest quality genetic material.”

  “Meat grown in a cup. What I figured. I’d like to sit at the bar.”

  Harley sat at the bar in the corner of the restaurant. He ate beef enchiladas and chips and salsa and watched the rest of the diners eat and laugh and enjoy a meaningless meal of food printed in a laboratory. He left the restaurant in a sour mood and walked back to his hotel.

  He stripped out of his new clothes and finished his whiskey and chased it with beer. He couldn’t tell you why it bothered him to eat meat that had been grown and printed in an imaging lab instead of having the chance to live before it died. It had tasted the same, perhaps even better and it had been just as filling. But it left him filling unsatisfied. Is that what Quinlan had meant, about humanity rotting at the core? We aren’t living anymore, only synthesizing life. Maybe he was putting too much significance on a meal, he didn’t know for sure. But in the Hubs it sure seemed like you spent a lot of time pretending.

  He fell asleep on top of the covers. He did not dream.

  Chapter Nine

  Bargains

  Marshal Jodi Tempest was not a woman you had to be introduced to twice. While short of stature and slim of build, she cast a shadow over everyone she met.

  Her hair was long and blonde and tied in a tight ponytail and her eyes were so brightly blue they whispered of the clearest of skies, the deepest of waters. Her body was lean and muscular and she carried herself with such calm confidence that few ever dared stand in her way. Those who did usually came to regret their decision. She looked like she was in her thirties but with medprint it was hard to gauge a person’s age anymore. Like all Federation Marshals, she wore a simple earth-toned shirt and pants that followed every curve of her body and a sidearm was strapped to her slim waist and slung low. Pinned above the soft curve of her left breast was the star of the Federation Marshals. Behind her right ear, a scye softly hummed and unlike most scyes, which glowed yellow, blue or green, hers glowed an angry red like some great malevolent eye. Harley thought she programmed it that color for effect and he was right. It was a sign of a Marshal.

  They had met a number of times in the Wilderness and had developed an appreciation for each other’s talents. Harley had never visited her in the Hub and hadn’t been sure she would see him. He was pleased that she had so quickly granted him an audience.

  Her door opened to him just after 7 a.m. She left him standing in the middle of the room for a time as she paced with her hands on her hips, her eyes distant as she took care of some such matter on the Link. Harley waited and enjoyed the view.

  Her office was at the top floor of the Justice Tower, which held not only the offices of the Marshal’s Service, but also the Hub Legion Commander. It was perhaps a little flagrant display of power that the Marshal’s star was above the Legion crest on the side of the building. Marshal Tempest’s office was also two stories above the offices of the legion. Marshals knew how to make a statement.

  When she finished on the Link, she turned around and smiled at him softly, folding her arms across her chest. “Harley Nearwater. It’s been some time.” She quickly let her eyes roam over his wiry frame. “You clean up nice. I like that silly hat of yours. You’re still ugly as hell though.”

  Harley
nodded. “I would say the same.”

  Jodi grinned. “But you would be lying.”

  “Yes.”

  “How are things in the Wilderness?”

  “More difficult than they need to be.”

  “Why is that?”

  "Technology is a pain in my ass.”

  “It's hard to be a thief if your Link is always telling everyone what you've stolen, isn't it?"

  "Even without it you can't just sneak away with someone's jewelry because it will send out an alert if stolen. Technology has made it difficult for a dishonest man to make a living."

  "Easier to be a law abiding citizen, isn't it?"

  Harley smiled. "Not sure I’d go that far."

  "The Federation is considering making it mandatory for everyone to have a linktag to receive their RTI funds each week."

  "That would severely impact my consumption of alcohol."

  "And what a shame that would be."

  "Keep going like this and there won't be a place in this world for a criminal and if there're no criminals, why would we need Marshals?"

  "Don't despair. There's always rape and murder. What brings you out of the Wilderness?"

  “Questions.”

  “Questions? You know Harley,” she slinked toward him and he remembered the cats stalking him. “We have this marvelous thing called the Link. You could have asked your questions with a simple thought.”

  Harley nodded. “Could have. Chose not to.”

  “You are a relic aren’t you Harley?” He shrugged, and when she motioned for him to sit on a leather couch in the corner, he did so. She sat in a chair across from him. “Ask your questions. I may have some of my own.”

  Harley leaned forward, clasped his weathered hands together. He would have to tread carefully. Or not. “Is the Legion by chance missing one of its legionnaires?”

  Jodi smiled, and her smile revealed nothing. “I am the Utah Hub Marshal. If you have a question about the Legion, you should ask the Legion.”