In spite of the situation, Kel’s overactive mind leapt to several possible solutions. She shook her head, as much to say no, as to clear it. She reminded herself she had deliberately kept the recording time down to a minimum because she didn’t know what the side effects of prolonged use would be. “I’m not sure what you’re going on about, but I do know you have no right to be in my home making strange demands.”
“Dr Rafferty, we’re a government agency and we see tremendous potential in your device for enhancing our military capabilities. The application for improving sniper concentration and accuracy alone means it is your patriotic duty to put this device to work for your country.”
“Not a chance!” Kel was horrified. “That thing is not meant to help people kill. And I don’t care what agency you claim to be, but my government doesn’t go around breaking into people’s homes and demanding they hand over intellectual property and provide free labour.” Kel wished she felt as certain as she sounded. Surely you only saw this stuff in spy thriller VRs? Now she was regretting not having paid more attention to politics and the news. “Who are you with?”
The man glanced at his partner, who was looking less sure of himself than he had been before. “We’re Department of Defence,” he said.
Kel’s confidence rose. Perhaps she could outbluff them. “And not in uniforms? I hate to break this to you two clowns, but we have a Ministry of Defence in this country, not a department. Now I can’t tell whether this is some type of con, or what, but you’ve wasted enough of my time. Get out before I ping the police.”
The man smirked. “Not going to happen. My friend here has a damper field on. No signals in or out of anything within twenty metres of him.”
Kel tried to gauge if she had room to get around him and out the door. “Then there will be a repair team here soon, to investigate a dark spot in the thingweb.”
“We’ll have you out of here long before then,” said the man. “You will come with us, and we will have your cooperation.”
“Enough,” said the other man. He pulled a gun from his pocket, quick as lightning, and fired. There was a muffled bang, and the top of Kel’s left leg felt as though it had been struck by a baseball bat. She looked down, disbelieving, as a burning, electric sensation seared through her thigh. Her trousers suddenly felt hot and wet. The leg wobbled and then collapsed under her. She crashed to the floor, losing her grip on the candlestick. It rolled away behind her.
“You shot me!” Kel gasped.
“Goddammit,” the first man said, glaring at his partner. “What happened to using a Taser?”
“She probably has a brainjack,” the shooter replied. “She’s no good to us fried.”
Kel lunged at the candlestick. The first man moved fast, planting a sharp kick just above her wound. She yelled and grabbed her leg, curling into a ball to ward off another kick. The man cursed again and fumbled in a pocket. In a haze of pain, Kel took comfort in the thought things obviously were not going as planned for them.
They produced something like a pillowcase, which they jammed over her head. She felt them grab her roughly, one arm each. They hauled her upward and pushed her forward. She pretended to cooperate for a few hobbling steps, and then deliberately fell, tripping him and sending one crashing into his partner. She heard one man thump into something — her wall? — and hoped it was headfirst.
She sat up and wrenched the sack off her face in time to see the shooter’s fist before it smashed into her nose. The force of the blow sent her back down to the floor, hard, and she blacked out.
RAY
Tomasso was waiting outside Ray’s apartment in a private, unmarked pod. Ray got in, feeling nervous. Something about Tomasso’s invitation that morning, the way he pulled him aside, quietly, murmuring in his ear, had filled him with dread. Was he about to have another surprise surgery? Had he screwed up so badly he was about to be offed? He was so close to figuring out what Mick had been doing at the drone company.
Tomasso only nodded at him as the pod pulled away. Never a man of many words, he stayed silent, staring out into the deepening darkness.
Ray rubbed the sweat off his forehead. Even though it was almost 9:00 p.m., it was still oppressively hot and humid outside. He recalled a cartoon VR he’d seen one morning, peering into someone’s living room, about how the dog days of summer had to do with some star rising in July, rather than anything to do with panting dogs. He tried looking up through the pod window at the sky as if doing so would help him remember the name of the star, but he couldn’t see much through the wash of the flowlights. Ray noticed his knee was bouncing up and down and forced himself to sit still.
The pod took them on a fast drive across the middle of Toronto and out to the east. Past North York, Ray wasn’t sure where they were or where they were headed. The pod’s dashboard remained dark, probably at Tomasso’s insistence.
After about half an hour, they pulled off a main artery and into a tree-lined suburb. Ray gazed with envy at the beautiful homes and well-kept front yards zipping past. He wondered what sort of person he would be now if he’d grown up in one of these houses, instead of the hovels and shelters he remembered.
The pod slowed just as they were about to go around a curve, and pulled into a small layby near a thickly wooded area. A sign declared the space to be Cudia Park, and Ray’s heart beat faster. It didn’t look like it was a well-lit place that would be filled with potential witnesses at this time of night.
Tomasso hopped out and motioned for Ray to follow. Ray did so, reluctantly, allowing the gap between him and the gangster to grow a little. If he had a gun, it wouldn’t help much, but if he had a knife, Ray might stand a chance if he wasn’t within easy striking distance.
Tomasso followed the walking trail into the trees, pulling a flashlight from a trouser pocket; save for the small white beam, it was pitch black underneath the canopy. They walked along the path for a while, Tomasso glancing back from time to time to make sure Ray was still following. Then they left the trail, crunching through the underbrush. Their footsteps seemed unbearably loud in the darkness.
They had walked for several more minutes when Ray noticed Tomasso had donned AR glasses. He also realised there was moonlight filtering through the trees ahead and he could feel a slight breeze. After another hundred paces, Tomasso brought them to a halt, and Ray’s breath caught in his throat. Now he knew where they were: atop a bluff overlooking the lake, and the view was both nerve-wracking and spectacular. It was a sheer drop of several dozen metres to the beach below.
Tomasso indicated the water with his chin. “Is nice, yes?”
Ray grunted his agreement, still very tense.
Tomasso cast him a sidelong look. “You got balls, I give you that,” he said. “I would not have followed me out here. Not without knowing.”
Ray took that as licence to ask the obvious question. “So what are we doing?”
The man shrugged. “You are useful to Dom,” he said. “He protects his assets. You do nothing stupid, you gonna be around for a while. I got cash — real cash, not Dom’s crypto — buried under here.” He pointed to a large tree behind them. “I got a sister, she’s got a kid. If I get killed, you take it to them, yes?”
The knots in Ray’s shoulder muscles loosened. “Oh. Okay, yeah,” he said. “How am I going to find this spot again?”
“I give you the GPS and my sister’s address,” Tomasso replied. “I bring you here tonight so you can see for real, know what it looks like. I check it lots. I add to it. I count it.”
Ray doubted he could tell one tree from another, especially in the dark, but he nodded anyway. Tomasso seemed pleased. He reached into a pocket and pulled out a large flask, unscrewed the lid, and passed it to Ray. The smell of cognac punched the air. Ray took a swig and handed it back. Tomasso took a long drink and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. They looked out over the lake again in silence, passing the bottle between.
“So why now?” Ray said after a while, deciding to test t
hings a little. Obviously, Tomasso had decided he trusted him, and maybe he could deepen the connection, and learn more. “Dominic’s been making lots of moves lately. Something I should be worried about, something big?”
“Eh, maybe. The Dom is pushing hard — some people don’t like it. Most likely, I think I got one strike left.”
“Oh yeah?” Ray wasn’t sure what he meant.
“Yeah,” Tomasso took several more gulps of the liquor. “I mess up twice now. Next one, that’ll be all.” He drew his finger across his throat.
“You sure?” Ray accepted another small pull from the bottle and returned it. “I see you with Dominic all the time. Everyone knows you’re his second. You’d have to do something terrible to make him want to lose you.”
Tomasso made a dismissive gesture. “The first time, it was no so bad,” he said, his accent thickening as he drank more. “This last time, it was no so good. The Dom is not a patient man.” He took a few more gulps, grimacing as it burned its way down. He laughed. “No so good at all.”
“What did you do?”
“We kill the wrong guys,” Tomasso said. “The wrong guys, can you believe it! Two Joes downtown. Drone assassination, very big mess.”
Ray went very still.
Tomasso drained his bottle, and patted his pockets, feeling for another. “I mean, pffft, a couple of dead bodies, who cares? No big deal. And I no so stupid as to have the drone trace back to us.” He found his other flask and pulled it out, shaking it to see how full it was. “But the Dom, he was mad we didn’t get the guy he wanted.”
“This was the thing in the winter?” Ray could barely choke the words out.
“Yeah, yeah, this is the other problem,” Tomasso shook a finger as though scolding. “See, you heard about it. He said I should learn what discreet means. Hits should not be headlines, he said. Bah!” He fumbled the lid off the bottle and drank. “So, one strike left for me. Then I get to be your next replay recording.” He shuddered and gripped his flask so tightly the sides dented inward.
Ray swayed, and suddenly the noises of the wood behind them and the water below them were too loud and the light of the moon was far, far too bright.
Tomasso rolled up his sleeve. The word discreet had been carved into his forearm. The scars were still red.
Ray saw Mick’s dead body, his face a nightmare of melting, morphing features freeze-framing into glimpses of all the people he’d ever worked over in The Room.
The wrong guys, can you believe it!
He saw himself wake up in the hospital and watched as he exploded when he realised what he had lost.
A couple of dead bodies, who cares?
“Not two dead bodies, Tomasso. Just one.”
“Huh?”
Ray swung his right fist in a fast, wide arc to the left, smashing it into Tomasso’s face. Tomasso’s flask went flying, and he stumbled backward, his arms flailing. Ray ducked low and charged, his shoulder digging deep into Tomasso’s stomach, slamming him into a tree trunk. The impact bent Tomasso double, knocking the wind out of him, and Ray crouched and then lunged upward, lifting Tomasso bodily off the ground and slinging him over his shoulder like a wet sack.
Who cares? No big deal.
He spun around, took three long strides to the edge of the bluff, skidded to a stop, and heaved Tomasso into the void.
Tomasso bounced once off the cliff face, a shockingly heavy thud against solid earth that reverberated under Ray’s legs. Then he fell, end over end like a rag doll, until finally, he was a crumpled, dark heap on the beach.
Retching and shaking so hard he could barely walk, Ray grabbed the flask he had been drinking from and staggered out of the woods. It took him all night to walk back to his apartment.
As the sun rose, he ate a steak Dominic had left him for his breakfast.
SETH
Seth accepted the four sticky-kid hugs without too much grimacing before taking a cleaner hug from his sister Sandy.
“Thanks again, Seth,” she said. “That was great. The kids always enjoy time with you, but today was extra special. I think you may have sparked a career interest in Lucca.”
They were queued up at the pod beacon station just outside the Toronto Zoo, waiting for their turn at the head of the line where they’d be paired up with a ride home. After the hug, Lucca had resumed his intense study of a book about bears. His younger siblings were engaged in a loud game of rock, paper, scissors.
Seth tried to look nonchalant, but inside, he was very pleased. It had been a long time since he’d been able to play the extravagant uncle role, taking them out somewhere fun, instead of making do with toys at his apartment. And although the kids had gotten increasingly fractious towards the day’s end — it was hot and they were all getting tired — it had been fun. He’d been looking for an excuse to visit the Centre’s new conservation and citizen science training exhibit since they had built the facilities on the old parking lot area ten years ago.
“Ah good, I’m glad everyone enjoyed it,” he said. “Now I’ve got more time work-wise, we must do this more often.”
If Sandy knew the real reason was money, rather than time, she didn’t say. They reached the front of the line, so she gave him another quick squeeze and herded his nephews and nieces into a pod. He climbed into the next one, waving goodbye.
“Destination?” the pod asked.
“Harvie Flow at St. Clair,” Seth replied.
“Estimated arrival time, forty-two minutes.” The pod accelerated away from the station. “Entertainment options?”
He was distracted by the sight of a swarm of spider buildbots printing what looked like residential units. “Hey, I didn’t think they were allowing new housing developments out this way.”
“If you are referring to the building project to your right, it is a temporary facility designed to accommodate a large academic conference in December. The finished constructs will be relocated to a development area in Vaughn in the spring.”
“Huh,” Seth craned his neck to see them again. They looked like they would be nice when they were done. He wondered if he would be able to afford one in a few years’ time. A vision of how he might decorate it popped into his head and made him smile.
“Amusement options?”
“Headlines. Maybe arts and entertainment.”
“Breakout VR star Meike Bergholtz made a surprise appearance at the Royal Alexandra Theatre to the delight of fans. She announced she would take on a role in the upcoming stage production of Uncle Vanya and there would be a VR tie-in allowing ticket holders to role play in the garden of the Serebryakov family estate.”
“Fun if you’re into Chekhov, I guess. Next?”
“Organisers have said next year’s red carpet Argy Awards will be held in Vancouver in June. Competition for the top award in augmented-reality productions is expected to be fierce, as several strong contenders have already been revealed ahead of the usual new releases season.”
Seth wondered if there was also an award show for virtual reality productions; he’d never paid attention to such things before now. There had to be a category he could enter that supercut video he’d been thinking of, showing all the times he’d died in his short-lived career as a game farmer. “Next.”
“Author Marty Foley, whose debut novel ZOMG shot to the top of the bestseller list in fiction this week, says he has already written a sequel. He promises that it is ‘even more twisted’ than the first book.”
“Wait, what?”
“I’m sorry, I do not understand your query. Shall I proceed with the next headline?”
“No,” he said sharply, an uneasy sensation overtaking him. “Tasha,” he said, addressing his DPA instead of the pod computer, “have I met Marty Foley?”
“Yes,” Tasha replied. “At the conference last month. He was one of several people you sold a copy —”
“No, no, NO!”
“I’m sorry —” both computers began.
“Shut up,” Seth said. He ta
pped the pod dashboard screen to pull up a thingweb story about Foley. The picture showed him looking more tired and drawn than Seth remembered. It said Foley credited an intense regimen of meditation and exercise, combined with divine inspiration for the story and the speed with which he was able to complete the sequel. Critics were calling the book a ‘lyrical masterpiece,’ that was ‘open to infinite interpretations’ and ‘brimming with life.’
“It’s a book about zombies.” Seth muttered. “Zombies! Who writes about those things anymore?”
His chest felt tight, and he could barely breathe. It felt so unfair. He was certain Marty had exploited his replay recording to finish his first novel and write the second in record time. How he’d gotten the first one published so fast he didn’t know. Right now, he didn’t have the heart to figure it out.
Seth pressed clenched fists hard into his legs. Marty had used the one thing Seth had ever managed to sell easily to beat him to the prize. With his first book. It was a gut punch. A mixture of jealousy and rage over his own stupidity made him feel lightheaded. Why had he sold copies of his implant recordings? It had been an advantage and he’d practically given it away. He had a vision of Dario, a disapproving frown on his face, coming to fetch Lucca away from him. In his head, his mother’s voice asked him when he would get a real job.
His chest constricted further; he could feel his heart thumping. “Stop the pod,” Seth said.
“We are on the Don Valley Flow,” the pod nav said. “I do not recommend disembarking.”
“Stop the pod,” Seth grated. “I need air.”
The pod gracefully swerved left through four lanes of traffic and came to a halt at the side of the flow. Seth got out, shielding his eyes against the low evening sun. The other pods zipped by, creating a constant, gusty breeze. He walked in a daze, looking out over Toronto, thinking of all the people in the city, and probably across the country, who now knew Marty’s name. Seth stopped and leaned against the barricade, his forehead pressing into a railing still warm from the heat of the day. Seth felt like he was seven again, seated at the dining room table, desperately thirsty, asking patiently for a glass of water, and never getting any, while all about him his siblings yelled and were shouted at and cuffed, but got what they wanted.
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