by John Freitas
They heard a screech and crash behind them. There were more screams. They turned in time to see a delivery truck scrape off the front of a car as it barreled diagonally toward them. The driver’s eyes glowed almost as bright as Pixie’s still staring at them across the street.
Jeffery grabbed Thomas’s arm and they ran past the café. The delivery truck plowed into the building, smashed the bench, and dumped brick on top of their bags. Only the tracker and infuser in Thomas’s hands were spared.
The driver pitched through the windshield and tumbled over the spilled brick onto the sidewalk. He stood with his eyes dull again and dusted shattered glass off his coveralls.
“Is she doing this?” Jeffrey asked.
“Generation two has to follow orders,” Thomas said, huffing and puffing.
The protestors turned on the pair and began crossing the street with their signs raised and eyes bright. A car laid down on its brakes, but still clobbered some of the group, sending the androids spinning into the air and crashing back to the street. The others kept coming toward Thomas and Jeffrey like nothing had happened.
Pixie turned and ran up the sidewalk faster than she should have been able to do in that skirt.
“Come on,” Thomas said. “The only way to stop this is to stop her.”
As they ran, Jeffery said, “There are a lot of androids in this city. We may not survive this.”
Thomas kept running without answering.
A carriage with fake galloping horses ran up into the lane beside them. The driver cracked his whip at them. One slash caught Thomas’s shoulder and cut through his shirt, leaving a mark.
The carriage ran up on the sidewalk. Thomas pulled up short to avoid being hit as the carriage flipped over in the air in front of them.
He pulled Jeffrey out into the street with him and they ran toward Pixie’s back diagonally through the street.
“This is a bad idea,” Jeffrey yelled.
Another companion in a hoop skirt closed her umbrella and stepped off the sidewalk between Thomas and Pixie. Her owner shouted at her back, but she didn’t respond with her glowing eyes fixed on Thomas.
She took a swing and Thomas ducked. She brought the umbrella up like a spear and prepared to stab. Thomas jabbed the infuser into her neck. The android’s eyes went dark and she collapsed in the street.
The woman on the curb shouted. “You’re going to pay for that! She was expensive!”
Another companion lifted a car over his head and approached the men.
Jeffery said, “Thomas!”
A rickshaw swerved to miss the car-toting android, but they collided and the car collapsed on top of both of them.
Thomas and Jeffery ran around and jumped on the sidewalk behind Pixie. She was moving faster through the crowd, but Thomas and Jeffery ran after her anyway.
A waiter picked up a chair and swung it back behind his head as he approached the men. Thomas jabbed his arm with the infuser and took the waiter down.
A woman put a child down on the step and then proceeded to tear a light post out of the concrete. Thomas jabbed her back, taking her down before she could take a swing with the post.
“How much more of that do you have?” Jeffrey asked.
“Some. Not enough for the whole city.”
A car crashed into a store behind them, shattering the window and disappearing inside.
Thomas took a turn down the next street, but did not see Pixie. An android knocked the infuser out of Thomas’s hand with a broom handle. Then, he grabbed Thomas by his throat and lifted him off the ground against the wall. Thomas couldn’t breathe.
The android’s eyes blazed like spotlights and he said, “I told you not to follow me. You should listen. You are fragile and I’m trying not to be the baker.”
Jeffrey injected the android’s arm. He crumbled to the street and Thomas dropped to his feet, gasping for air.
“Are you okay, Thomas?”
Thomas took the infuser back from him. “We have to keep going. She’s gotten too powerful. We can’t let her get away.”
They ran along the sidewalk and came to a bridge over five lines of railroad tracks.
“There,” Jeffery said.
She was running down one of the tracks away from the bridge.
Thomas climbed over the side and jumped.
“Thomas!”
He hit the grassy slope and tumbled down to the tracks. Thomas recovered the tracker and infuser and began running after her. He didn’t look back to see if Jeffery was following.
They reached a yard where coal and lumber dumped into carrier cars. Pixie ran by the workers in her hoop skirt and bonnet. The android and human workers all turned to watch her go.
Thomas came staggering behind her. She caught the back of a train rattling along the tracks, picking up speed as it left the loading yard. She climbed up into the bed of the back most car as Thomas ran along the tracks behind.
Pixie picked up a log and hurled it at him. Thomas dodged as the log splintered on the tracks. She threw another and he dodged again. By that point, the train was pulling away and leaving him behind.
Thomas ran to a stop and bent over, holding his knees as he watched her roll away on the train heading west.
He turned and saw the android workers walking toward him with their eyes glowing. Some had rebar or shovels in their hands. The human workers looked back and forth at each other.
Thomas brought up the infuser, but knew he wasn’t going to be able to hit them all fast enough. He thought about Eve as he waited.
Their eyes faded and they stopped short. The androids paused, but then turned away to return to their work as if nothing happened.
Thomas looked over his shoulder as the train disappeared into the trees.
When he looked back, human police officers were walking Jeffery between them up the tracks toward Thomas.
“Drop them and show us your hands, sir.”
Thomas gritted his teeth. He carefully sat the tracker and infuser onto the tracks and stood up with his hands raised.
15
“What is this?” The man in a suit and tie sitting across the table from Thomas held up the infuser.
“It is designed to temporarily disable an android’s brain,” Thomas said.
He wondered where they had Jeffrey. The police had brought them both in separately and kept them apart.
The man turned the infuser sideways. “What happens if I use it on you?”
“Nothing. It won’t discharge on anything biological or if it does not detect an android frequency signature.”
The officer acted as if he was going to press it against Thomas’s arm. Thomas didn’t move. The officer frowned and set it aside. “What does CDR think about you shutting down their androids?”
“The androids belong to the people or companies that purchased them.”
“The androids you destroyed have some very unhappy owners, Dr. Kell.”
Thomas sighed. “They were malfunctioning.”
“That’s just it.” The officer shook a finger at Thomas. “I’m wondering if you made them malfunction. The path of destruction seemed to follow your path.”
“The androids were out of control. I had the infuser and thought I could help by stopping them before they hurt anyone.”
“Lots of people got hurt, Dr. Kell.” He opened a folder in front of him. “Your friend is telling a very different story in the next room. He’s getting ready to make a deal and unfortunately the first one to talk gets the best deal. Maybe we will just wait to get the true story from him.”
“He’s not telling you any story because there’s no story to tell,” Thomas said.
The officer frowned and closed the folder. “Here’s the story then. CDR fired you for industrial espionage. Dr. Danvers still works for them, but has gone missing. You both came down here to commit acts of terror against androids and their owners to get back at CDR. Because of the Emergency Powers Act, we can hold you indefinitely. So, how does
that all sound to you, Doctor?”
“I’m a consultant for Caster Tech and I’m here for a trade show. The infuser and our other equipment that was destroyed during the accident are meant to help android owners. Nothing we have can cause androids to act that way. Someone else is responsible for that,” Thomas said.
“Who?”
“I don’t know,” Thomas said.
“That’s a shame,” the officer said. He placed a grainy photo of Pixie wearing sunglasses by a pickup truck in front of Thomas on the table. “Can you tell me who, or rather what, that is?”
Thomas leaned forward and looked. He sat back. Thomas swallowed. “That is Pixie. She is a third generation series android prototype from CDR Research.”
The officer stared. He blinked a few times. “Is that why you are in Charleston, Dr. Kell?”
“I’m here for a trade show.”
The officer rolled his eyes and waved Thomas off. He picked up another photo and placed it next to the first. The picture was taken from above in the rail yard with Pixie in her dress running after the train. Thomas himself was small in the background.
The officer tapped the photo. “Is that the same Pixie android from CDR and from the first photo?”
“It is.”
“And that’s you chasing her before she climbed on a train bound for New Orleans?”
“New Orleans?” Thomas looked up.
The officer stared for a moment. He nodded. “Yes, that’s you chasing her?”
“Yes.”
“With your android knockout gun?”
“Yes.”
“That you brought to Charleston for your convention for your tech company located on a tiny island in the Bahamas?”
“A trade show,” Thomas said.
“Did Pixie escape from CDR and make you to come down here to stop her, Dr. Kell?”
Before he could answer, the door opened and a uniformed officer handed a paper off to the man in the suit. The uniform stepped back out as the officer in the suit read the page. He folded it over and placed it on the table before looking across at Thomas.
“You work for the CIA?”
Thomas narrowed his eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The officer sighed. “If you had just told us that to start with, we could be going after the real problem instead of wasting time here with you. We could help you, you know?”
Thomas shook his head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The officer held up his hand. “I got it. You’re a ghost. Take your friend and get out of here. Is the threat out of our city?”
Thomas shrugged. “Sounds like I need to go to New Orleans.”
“I wish you’d never come here,” the officer said. “Half the people in the city think the androids are soulless demons or ghosts. That rampage today didn’t help.”
“Sorry for the trouble, officer.”
“Get out.”
Thomas left the station with Jeffrey.
Jeffrey stuffed his phone and wallet back in his pocket as his items were handed back to him at the front desk. “What happened?”
“Be quiet until we get outside.”
Thomas and Jeffery stepped out onto the sidewalk. Officers walked past them in and out of the front doors as if Thomas and Jeffery weren’t there. Thomas adjusted the satchel on his shoulder.
“I can’t believe we got out of there. What happened? Why did they think we worked for the CIA?” Thomas asked.
Jeffery looked at Thomas. “CIA? They just let me go. I kept asking for a lawyer. I thought they were going to kill me.”
Jeffery’s phone rang and he pulled it from his pocket. He squinted and looked up at Thomas. “It’s for you.”
Thomas took it from him. It was his own phone number and he answered on the fifth ring. “Eve?”
“You’re welcome, Uncle Tommy.”
“I’m not sure I want to know how you found out we were arrested,” he said, “or how you faked CIA credentials, but how did you know we just got out?”
“You don’t seem to appreciate the power of the gear CDR dropped on you here,” she said.
Thomas sighed and looked around himself. He waved Jeffery over and they started walking down the sidewalk away from the police station. “Yeah, I’d probably appreciate it more if I hadn’t got most of it smashed along with my underwear by a delivery truck.”
“I could have done without that detail,” she said.
Thomas smiled. “Focus the search around New Orleans and figure out how to get me money for tickets.”
Eve said, “See if you can find the Western Union. There’s one two blocks up next to the bank.”
16
Dr. Thomas Kell stretched as he stepped off the bus. He leaned on a tree outside the fence, looking at the library across the street from the station.
“I think we could have walked here faster,” he said. “She has a four day lead on us at least. She could be halfway across the country by now. Or outside the U.S. even.”
“This is the last place she was headed,” Jeffrey said.
Thomas shook his head. “She could have jumped off the train anywhere between Charleston and here. She probably did.”
“Eve says she got a couple blips here in New Orleans before we arrived,” Jeffrey said. “Either she is here or was here.”
“Or she figured out how to fake a signal to keep us off her trail – chasing ghosts.”
“You think she could do that, Dr. Kell?”
“I think we are slowly reaching a point where she could do most anything she wanted.”
A cab pulled up by the curb and the door to the back popped open. The driver leaned over into view. It was a very human motion except for the dull glow of his eyes. The low light in the car made them seem brighter. Thomas thought his own barely contained panic added to the effect as well.
“Can I help you gentlemen to your destination?” The android driver had captured the distinctive character of a New Orleans accent. Thomas assumed that was carefully programmed in by the cab company and not something the android picked up on its own.
Jeffery took a step toward the car, but Thomas put his hand across Jeffrey’s chest. “We’re going to walk it, but thanks anyway.”
“Suit yourselves,” the android said.
The door closed itself and the car pulled away.
Jeffrey shouldered the backpack that had the few items he had bought on their long trip to the city by bus. “You think Pixie was going to have him drive us into the Mississippi River?”
Thomas sighed and said, “I don’t know.”
“She could just have easily had him drive up on the sidewalk and run us over, if she were close enough to see us,” Jeffrey said.
“Maybe so.” Thomas turned and started walking.
Jeffrey fell in step beside him. Thomas followed the directions Eve had given him from the bus station to the reasonably priced hotel. As they made the turn, a number of shops and bars were still boarded over and abandoned. Trash was bagged and stacked high outside each one.
One man in a dark apron stood outside one bar that was in operation, but closed at the moment. He gave a passing look at Thomas and Jeffrey walking by. He hosed down the edges of the doors and windows of his place as if he was trying to clear away an unseen layer of filth clinging to the walls.
“You sure this is the way?” Jeffrey asked.
“I’m sure these are the directions I was given,” Thomas said.
Jeffrey looked back and forth on the deserted street. “Seems like an odd way to take us.”
“My teenage niece has never been to New Orleans as far as I know,” Thomas said. “She probably mapped the shortest distance as opposed to the most scenic route.”
“If you’re sure,” Jeffrey said. They walked past a large man in a sequined dress curled up by a wall where he slept. “It is sort of scenic.”
“I’ve been fired by CDR for a little while now, but I’m sure I still have eno
ugh faculties to follow basic directions I’m given, Jeffrey.”
Jeffrey nodded. “I’m sure, Doctor. I have no doubts in you.”
Thomas sighed and made a turn at the next street. There was more foot traffic and less trash. Several buildings and houses were still boarded over. There were people sitting out on metal balconies on the third and fourth levels. Some had hanging plants. One had several dozen pinwheels spinning in the winds of the higher level. Another woman had a talk radio station playing as a bubble machine sent a storm of bubbles out into the wind.
“I wish I had visited here before the Pulse,” Jeffrey said.
“What do you mean?” Thomas asked.
“I never really went much of anywhere,” Jeffrey said. “I was at MIT and Stanford for a while. I spent more time in the labs than I did seeing anything. I moved to CDR with the AI program shortly after the Pulse and eventually came on for the gen two Quantum Brain project with you. I never saw Chicago before the Pulse or really anywhere else. I’ve traveled more on this trip than I have my whole life. I just wish I had taken time to do it more earlier in my life … or at all, I guess I’m saying.”
Thomas grunted and shrugged. “I’m guessing this trip isn’t giving much time for sightseeing either.”
“We’ve seen a lot,” Jeffrey said. “We’ve just been running for our lives through a lot of it.”
“That’s true.”
“When we were on the train headed down the coast, we caught glimpses of the beaches from New York down to the Carolinas,” Jeffrey said. “I remembered going to the beach with my parents in Northern California where I grew up. I was trying to remember the last time I had been and I think I was eight or nine years old with my family.”
“You may have a lot of time on your hands soon,” Thomas said. “Depending on whether Pixie destroys faith in the entire generation two companions or in CDR completely.”
“Even if this works out,” Jeffrey said, “I’m not sure how CDR is going to take to me running off on an unannounced sabbatical.”
Thomas sighed, “Yeah, CDR has never been particularly fond of surprises, I’m afraid.”
“There was so much competition for positions there,” Jeffrey said. “After the Pulse, it was almost an option of working with CDR or starving to death. The government got tight on research grants for the university system when they had to rebuild the world.”