Up The Tower

by J. P. Lantern

  Ore stood up, and the dog’s head was emptied out on the floor.

  “What I tell you,” she said. “Skulls, no problem.”

  Gary looked back at the other dog, the one that had been trapped under the door. The poor creature was still alive. The door had come down in a way that pushed through its head and trapped its suddenly broken neck. Whimpering. Snot trails everywhere. Blood from its mouth. The snouts of the other dogs tried pushed beside it, snarling, teeth gnashing.

  “Jesus,” said Gary, sliding backward. “Jesus, Jesus.”

  Ore walked over to the dog, studied it for a second. First she bent over, as if to grab it, but the reaching mouths of the others gave her pause. Frowning, she raised her foot high and stomped it down hard on its skull—and then again a few more times.

  “I don’t like that,” she said. “Suffering. Not at all.”

  * * * * *

  I think it is worth the time to discuss the nature of the power structure in Junktown. Obviously, the Five Faces ran everything. As the only force capable of instituting anything like order in the area, this had become their right.

  It was a point of pride among some of the Five Faces that their power had been obtained through legitimate means—by which of course, I mean democratic means. However, like most democratic means in a land without oversight, corruption thrived. Corruption, indeed, became its own form of economy (they would say “hustle”) in Junktown. There were specialized runners who delivered bribes from place to place and other sorts of runners, known as “catchers,” who intercepted these runners; there were loan sharks dedicated solely to funding the process of bribery; there were “sequesters” whose job it was to hold onto bribes until an election result was satisfactorily given.

  It was a complex process which required quite a bit of political and financial acumen to stay on top of. Elections were once every three years. This was seen largely—through reports of several different sources all over the poverty spectrum—as, “a pain in the ass.”

  A great many records indicate Jackson Crash had several discussions with figures from Tri-American and Groove about setting up the Five Faces as a sovereign corporation, each with their own Corporate Share.

  We can safely assume that neither of the Bones brothers or Wallop knew about this dealing. These three were stout supporters of democracy, for all their myriad flaws, and despised the notion of corporate control—even their own. If they had known of Crash's plan, they would have murdered him in his sleep.

  Petrov is another matter. He is a subtle man, as no doubt you have already learned in school or through other records such as this. One interesting tidbit that I was not able to find too much evidence to support—but which is a theory I endorse and find fascinating as can be—is that it was Petrov who had been Oscar's nefarious third-party, the party to whom the clone was dealing stolen information.

  From Petrov's own writings:

  In all things we do, we ape the corpocracy. As the Five Faces, we are the CEOs of Junktown. All of the CEOs of the corps directly beneath us, such as the Tangerines or the Labor Dolls, are in fact our Shareholders. All of the sub-corps of these gang corporations are in fact our Citizens. The rest are merely employees, though they all believe they run their own hustle. The Citizens vote for Shareholders, the Shareholders vote for CEOs, and to stay in power, we buy their vote. I wished to make my position as a Face chronic so as to avoid the poisonous laze which the constant bribery and need for funds presents while real work remains to be done. Wallop refuses to see the overlap in duties of our positions and the positions of those in the corpocracy proper. It is perhaps due to his pride that he is different, that he is better, that his pursuit of wealth is somehow more nobler than it might be if he were to pursue wealth in the corporate world. But all pursuits of wealth are ignoble. There is no nobility to wealth; there can be nothing noble about pursuits which have no end.

  Now, doesn't that sound a bit like someone who would endorse a powerful third-party opposition to a bicameral corpocracy?

  In any case, he had no time in which to pursue his real goals. Many records have devoted themselves to the Junktown hypothesis—whether Petrov would have been able to create a real revolution in the arena of the slum to the corporate world which stymied all independence, in his mind. He talked often of a “terrific event” which would have to serve as the catalyst for change, and always was on the lookout for anything he could take advantage of in this regard.

  Too bad for him, he would not live past the event which allowed his vision to come true.

  * * * * *

  Two years before, Ore got called into a bar across the street from The Tower by Punchee Wallop.

  The bar was called Yahtzee's. It was a hang-out for Tower hopefuls and for Tower residents. It was also the bar that Wallop owned. He was the CEO of a gang—the Gatewaters—that ran liquor in Junktown. Technically speaking, liquor was legal to get. But if you got it from someone who wasn't Wallop or his gang, then you were in trouble. Junktown was a hellhole, so he had a nice steady clientele.

  In her time, Ore had come to believe that there was some part of humans that required a belief in something bigger than themselves. The folks what lived around her chose mostly money, and if they didn't choose money, they chose God.

  Wallop was the sort who despised that part of himself. That he had to believe in something bigger than he was meant he was a slave to it. So, he went out of his way to make everyone else subjected to him.

  His boys brought her to the backroom. Old pots and boxes of foodmatter lined the walls. Wallop sat on top of a small desk, his huge frame sagging the wood. He didn't have tech, then.

  “This is for you,” said Wallop.

  He opened a small crate full of liquor. Hardtop Brand. Red wax label.

  “For drinking or for buying?”

  Wallop shrugged. “Whatever you like.”

  “I don't drink much.”

  “It's for whatever you like.”

  “What's it for?”

  “I just said—”

  “No, I mean...why you giving it to me? I don't work for you. I ain't done nothing for you.”

  “I hear a young up-and-coming woman is making a name for herself in my area. I take it upon myself to give her a gift. In return, all I get are questions. Is this what to expect from you?”

  She looked at the crate and sat back in her chair. Lounged.

  “You and I both know that you're running for Face soon. You want something from me for that. Is that about right?”

  “Straight to the point, huh? All right. I like that. Smart girl. It's too bad, how smart you are.”

  “Too bad?”

  “Yeah.” He grabbed her arm, then, and broke it over his knee.

  On the ground, Ore tried to think through the pain. What had she taken? What got back to Wallop? Who had lied? She had been so careful...

  “This ain't all that much to do with you,” said Wallop. “In fact, it'd be worse for me if it was. It's better if it looks all random like this. You see, I can't have no competition in this place. I can't have people getting ideas. And when a youngster comes up, successful as you've been these last few months? And a woman?” He shook his head. “It makes it look easy. And then people who might have a chance against me might try something.”

  “I wouldn't...” she gasped. “You just gotta say...I wouldn't—“

  He picked her up, sat her back down on the chair. “I know! I know that. You're real nice. A trooper. That means someone else, one of these other sumbitches, they'd notice that too. And they might try and use you. And I can't use you because I can't have it looking like I'd use a woman.” He shrugged. “My base, you know. It wouldn't support it. So...”

  His hands closed around her skull.

  “...out of commission you go.”

  She didn't remember when he took her eye out. Later on, she would. Later on she would remember the sound of that wetness bursting out from her. She would know the sensation deep and dark; she
would know it in the way a shout can echo in a cave for centuries. But not then. An hour after Wallop finished, she came-to walking in east Junktown, spiraling from one end of the street to the other. She had a bottle of the Hardtop Liquor in her hand.

  Her broken arm hung loose at one side. Her vision was little more than an avenue for pain. Somehow, she rolled into a cutman's shop.

  The cutman was standing over someone already, doing leg modifications. She slapped down into a chair. Leather, low-back, like a barber's chair.

  “We're closed.”

  “Well open up.”

  She tossed all the money in her pockets at him. Wallop gave her some. What a nice guy.

  The cutman stepped over and looked at her, arms crossed. His head was bald, covered in his own tech. Gears whirred down and he examined her with a few magnifying lens. Then he counted the money.

  “This ain't enough.” He tapped her head. “You hear me? Wake up. Eyes open. Or eye, anyway. There we are. It's not enough, all right? You can get the eye or the arm. I can't do both.”

  Not so often is the future laid out in binary. It was almost a relief.

  “The arm, then.”

  She would need both arms to strangle Wallop.

  * * * * *

  “I do not believe what she said. I know you are a Good Dude.” Partner tried to grip Samson's hand. The metal fingers were all rent, though. “She must be very bad, for wanting to kill a Good Dude like you.”

  They were caught in a broken factory now, most of its equipment filed outward from the hard angle of The Tower. A few heavy workshop tables jockeyed for position at the wall nearest the edge, each trying to beat the other out. There was no way anymore to tell what had been made inside.

  Partner rolled on top of Samson, barely able to hold itself up. The front of its chest looked like a broken axe. Torn from Crash, from the strain of saving Samson. Small tendrils of sharp nanos reached for each other, trying to heal. The two of them were on a wall. There were large holes in the concrete all around.

  The only way out of the leaning, groaning Tower was up the stairs, and coming down those same stairs was Storey. Maybe Wallop, too.

  Wallop, you want his sister? Go get her.

  After all this time, Ore. She was alive. She was in The Tower. She was...

  She was dead. She had to be dead.

  You'll find each other soon enough.

  Partner was in bad shape. Even before the fall, Crash's blades had torn it up a good deal. If Partner had maybe a few hours and Samson had all the materials in the world, he could make it functional again. But as things were...

  It seemed hopeless. If the Tower didn't kill them, then Storey would. If they got past Storey, then Crash would.

  “They're coming, Partner.”

  “Yes. You hide. I will hold them off.”

  “Can we use your grappling hook?” Samson asked.

  Partner shook its head. “The motor is broken. Headquarters was not prepared for my jet maneuver. Too much backlash. When you escape, you will have to let them know. Tell them that P-L-Eight-Four-Five sent you. They will not know the name you gave me.”

  Deep, hoarse yelling powered down on them and the door of the small broken office busted open—Storey had found the pair.

  Thick frame all bloody, her hair a tangled mess across her face. She ran across the remains of the floor, shuffling and stumbling and yet still somehow not losing any speed. Her metal pipe swinging wildly overhead, like some carbonized thunderbolt, like a diagram of pain, like a long end to a short beginning.

  Samson ran—leaving Partner on the floor behind him. He thought Storey would only be going after him, but she surprised him. Her pipe clanged, wailing on Partner’s body.

  Go get her.

  No. He was the one Storey wanted.

  “Back off!”

  With a cry, he ran at Storey and pushed into her side with everything he had. The squalid thickness of her bulk did not move. Instead she backhanded Samson, knocked him down.

  Then, the worst thing, she laughed.

  “You know, I forgot about you. Skinny little thing. All the harm you done me, I forget. I built you up, you know that? I made you into an event. But you ain’t no event. You just one more sucker in this place.”

  Pipe lifted overhead, she swung down at him again, but Samson rolled out of the way. She rose again, struck again, and Samson rolled one more time—and then once more. On the third roll the Tower failed him and he nearly fell through a hole in the long wall that had become the ground. He shot his arms out, trying to power back up to his feet. He could do it, but he had a deficit of time—Storey lifted her pipe again.

  Triumphant music blaring suddenly, Partner grabbed Storey’s feet, throwing off her balance. The pipe clanged and sparked right next to Samson's head. Enraged, she kicked Partner across the factory floor, sending its hollow, open body skipping into the far wall. Samson ran after it. He didn’t know if he was going to live, but he knew he wouldn’t do a thing without Partner.

  Partner grinned, eyes bright, and took Samson’s hand. The grip, iron tight. Storey slashed her pipe out at the floor and walls as she stomped forward, laughing.

  There could have been any number of ways to interpret Partner’s nod—a goodbye, maybe? Samson didn’t know, he could only react. With his whole weight, he wrenched up and backward, swinging Partner wide. The robot landed roughshod on Storey’s chest.

  Laughing still, she stumbled back, and pushed Partner down. For a moment she was fine, her pipe raised once more. And then blood swelled out from her chest, dripping on down her body in a torrent of thick red. The pipe fell. Storey fell.

  The jagged, rough parts of Partner all covered with blood. One or two feet of metal and wires soaked in redness, some of them several inches long. Some parts razor thin, others thick like shelving. The tendrils still trying to meld together and meet.

  Panicking, Samson rushed on top of Storey, trying to cover the blood with her shirt. Her thick belly revealed. It was no use. Too much gushing, too quick.

  “I knew you, boy,” said Storey. “I knew you.”

  Like an old truck, she sputtered and hacked, and then she died.

  All a person’s life was like an intricate series of notes in a workbook, building up this design bit by bit until it all came together. You think that you’re writing in pen, or more than pen—in immutable bronze or marble. Carving out the shape that was already there.

  But even the people who hate you, know you. They could hardly hate you otherwise. And they erase themselves, or become erased, or you erase them. And there are no bronze notes in your notebook, no marble engravings. There are only the lightest of pencil markings, or even less than that; there are only names and words written in leaves, always ready to float away.

  “Samson-Partner.” The copbot raised up. “You must get out of here. I will stay behind. I will slow you down. Get to the escape pod.”

  Samson picked up Partner, then, rounding it over his shoulders. He knew where he had to go. There wasn’t choice left in the matter anymore at all. There never was. It was just a matter of if he could make it there before the building broke.

  “I can fix you,” said Samson. “I’m gonna fix you. So hold on.”

  * * * * *

  Seven floors up from where Ore had killed the dog. They were all tired now, too tired to talk. But close—so close to the elevator.

  At least, if Ore was right. Ana wasn’t sure how much to trust this girl. It wasn’t that she thought Ore was lying—not really. Rather, she just didn’t trust that Ore could really remember such a thing. Numbers, figures, locations—she hadn’t had any kind of real education, after all, being on the streets for so long. Ana couldn’t expect her to keep all that straight all the time. Best to be on guard, that was all.

  The Tower let out a long bellow and began to shake and swing. Through the narrow windows of the hall, Ana saw the clouds drifting back and forth—and realized that it was the window itself that was moving.
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br />   Gary, ahead of Ana, held on to the railing with his whole life. “Oh god, this is it!”

  Ore dug her tech hand into the concrete step before her. Little crumbles of dust slid down from it.

  Ana gripped the railing like Gary, wrapping her arms around its length and trying to prop herself up on the steps beneath her. There were a hundred thousand tons of concrete and steel above her and below her. It was terrible to think that they would crumble, like anything would crumble, and that she would be caught in the middle like so much jelly in a sandwich.

  Sounds of the building breaking echoed off the narrow stairwell. Concrete shifting out of itself, steel beams twisting and pushing through the walls, pipes bursting, odd computer sounds whining and whirring. The wall above them burst open and they all screamed.

  And then it stopped.

  They all stood up, unsteady, looking around for confirmation of their safety. The Tower was not crumbling down; it was not broken in half. Not yet.

  It had seemed, in fact, to steady out from its lean a bit. Straightening up once more. The aftershock must have somehow pushed it the other way.

  You see? Ana thought. Things work out for you. This is pre-determined. It is all moving at a purpose.

  “Everybody breathing?” asked Ore.

  Everybody was.

  “I thought the quake was done,” said Gary. “I thought it was all done.”

  “Maybe there's more,” said Ana. “Aftershocks, you know.”

  But trapped as they were, one guess was as good as another. Around the next curve of stairs, steam pushed down—a broken pipe from above them in the wall. They gathered in front of it, testing and withdrawing with their hands. It was hot. It was too hot, Ana thought.

  “Jesus,” said Gary. “Can we make it through?”

  “I don’t know,” Ana shook her head. “Can’t steam melt you? All that heat?”

  Ore tried the door at the foot of the stairs, but it was locked, the knob not turning. No panel, either, like last time.