All Rights Reserved

by Gregory Scott Katsoulis

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  I was going to walk to Malvika Place and try to get in, right through the front doors, but I only walked a block before I realized that was a laughable plan. I was letting frustration get the better of me. I had already acted rashly, and what good had that done? There would be guards. There would be questions. I would be far better served to enter through the roof, but Malvika Place extended outside the dome. How could I get up there?

  I realized it wouldn’t be smart to linger outside too long while I figured this out. I had not forgotten being dragged into that alley. I felt the barely perceptible scar on my chin, running my finger across the bump where the skin had knit slightly imperfectly. Margot’s Phisior™ bandage had done most, but not all, of its job.

  Across the wide ring with its racing cars, the outer shops were still lit. They would be open for another hour or so. They looked inviting—they were designed to—but I knew better than to head that way. I could only imagine how fast I would be kicked out for a lack of means, or hounded about my silence, or arrested for some trumped-up infraction. I could not even take refuge in a movie because I would not be able to agree to the theater’s Terms of Service before entering.

  A block ahead of me, Thomkins Tower beckoned. It was only seven stories tall and not so towerlike. The yellowed, opaque window in Mrs. Stokes’s room was lit above me. Once again, I could think of no other place to be.

  I climbed the stairs and made my way to her door. I pressed Mrs. Stokes’s buzzer and waited. I wondered what she would think of my tiny, stupid theft if she ever found out about it. Would she approve? Would she be disappointed?

  I pressed the buzzer again. I wondered if she knew about Bridgette Pell. Without a screen, how did she get her news? I hoped she didn’t know what had happened. I think it would have made her feel sadder.

  By the time I was ready to press her buzzer a third time, I sensed something was wrong. Why hadn’t she come to the door? Was it possible she wasn’t home? I buzzed again, insistently. I banged on the door, since I couldn’t call to her. Behind me, another apartment door opened. A girl with skin a little darker than mine looked out from the doorway. Her eyes were big and green. I didn’t recognize her from school, but she didn’t look much older than me. She shook her head imperceptibly and then retreated inside.

  I couldn’t ask what this meant, and I doubt she could have afforded to say. I listened for movement from inside Mrs. Stokes’s apartment, but I heard nothing. Where could she be?

  I decided to wait. I sat in the hall with my back to her door. My body settled down a little, and a giant yawn escaped from me. I closed my eyes and dropped my head to my knees.

  I imagined stealing a book for Mrs. Stokes. I imagined pilfering an orange for Sam. My thoughts clouded into dreams and back to desires for all the things we could have that might make life better. Then I thought of Kel and felt another pang of regret for taking the iChit™ player. I felt so stupid for that choice.

  Unease threaded through my dreams as Kel chastised me for stealing, or thinking of stealing, or wearing boots that clicked and thudded on roofs. Margot whispered that she knew I was a thief, and Henri shook his head and said he’d been wrong to love me. I couldn’t defend myself. Even in my dreams, I had no voice now.

  “Speth?”

  I awoke with a start. Mandett Kresh stood over me, looking puzzled. In his hand was a shopping bag filled with UltraGrain Harvest™ Bars. He looked to the door and then back at me.

  “Is she...?” His voice trailed away. He tried the buzzer, but I think he knew there would be no answer. The door across the hall had clicked open again.

  “Where is she?” Mandett asked the girl with the green eyes.

  The girl shook her head, pitifully, the same way she had with me. Mandett’s face contorted and his shoulder sagged with the weight of the bars. Food, I realized, he was bringing to Mrs. Stokes.

  “I get it, but this?” he said, loosely zipping his lips. “It isn’t working.” He sat down, his back to Mrs. Stokes’s door.

  The girl across the hall slipped back inside.

  “I’m going to wait,” he said. Then, after a few moments, he asked, “You think she’ll be back?” When I didn’t answer, he answered himself. “Maybe.”

  I couldn’t tell if he was trying to needle me, or if this was a habit of his. He peered over at my Cuff. “I give her an hour.”

  I looked down to check the time. My throat grew suddenly tight. I was an hour late for meeting my team. My heart started thumping. How had I let this happen? I jumped up, scrambling for the stairs, and nearly toppled over myself as I decided first to go down, then up—and then worried I wouldn’t be able to get through the rooftop door.

  I burst out, finding it not only unlocked, but without so much as a handle. I took running jumps across the rooftops and made for my locker.

  Kel had never discussed what would happen if I was late. She probably did not consider it an option. My back grew wet and tingly as I changed. I raced through the city, panicked I had made a terrible mistake.

  I dropped onto the roof of the Mandolin Inks™ building where we were supposed to meet. The rooftop was deserted. How long had they waited? Had they waited at all?

  I scanned in every direction, looking for the nearly invisible signs of the team. I saw nothing. The roof offered no clue about what direction they might have gone, or if anyone had even been there.

  An hour passed. I paced the roof, biting my knuckles, worrying about what would happen now, and what had happened to Mrs. Stokes and what would become of all of us. I scanned the city over and over, trying not to think the worst.

  What if Kel knew about the iChit™ player? What would she do? An icy chill ran down my spine. If Kel knew what I had done, and then I didn’t show up for our meeting, what picture would that paint of me?

  Even though it was foolish, I picked the lock on the roof door and scrambled down into the Mandolin Inks™ building, hoping to find a Squelch.

  I had no Pad. I had no idea if the Squelch existed, and even if one did, and I could find it, what good did I think that would do? Did I really believe Kel, Henri and Margot had been sitting below me in a Squelch for three hours? That made no sense.

  Heart pounding, I returned to the roof and considered my options. I could wait and hope they would come for me, or—what? I dropped my head in my hands. What else could I do? Give up?

  So I waited. I waited and hoped my punishment would be to spend the night twenty stories up under threat of losing my job. I dreaded the lecture Kel would give when it was all over, but more than that, I feared she wouldn’t come.

  What if I never saw them again? What if I had blown my only chance to keep my family together? It was almost too much to imagine.

  I sat for hours, until the dark, translucent gray of the dome flushed blue, then pink. As the colors changed, signaling dawn, the dregs of my hope ebbed away. The dome flared orange as the sun crested the distant horizon. A nauseating pit hardened in my gut. They truly weren’t coming.

  My limbs were cold in the damp morning air. The city slowly woke around me, oblivious and unconcerned with me and my silence.

  I forced myself to believe the Placers would find me again. Kel or Margot or Henri, I thought, might be watching right now, and I took comfort in that hope. Without them, I had nothing.

  It would end, I told myself, with a flashing dot in my vision, or with Henri swooping down and pulling me away to follow. But then any hope I might have had was obliterated.

  An Ad popped up on my Cuff, glowing and cheerful—a swirl of girly violets and pink offering me a better-smelling life with Jasminell™ Antiperspirant. I was ripe from panic, effort and worry; any Cuff could sniff that. But this meant something worse. Somewhere in the city, Kel must have finished the night’s Placement and canceled my contract. My Placer
’s protection against random Ads popping up was at an end. I was finished.

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  I could not work out the details of exactly what had happened. The broad strokes weren’t a mystery. I was certain Kel would not cut me off just for being late. She knew about the theft. I stole, then failed to show up.

  Wasn’t she curious about why I’d done it? Did she really believe I’d take something so meaningless and then slink off, never to return? The idea insulted me. How could she even be certain it was me? Maybe what pushed her over the edge was knowing I would not explain. If she had any impulse to give me the chance to explain, she knew it would only be rewarded with silence and a couple of centimeters of shrug.

  Did Henri fight to keep me in? Did Margot make excuses? Did it matter in the end? Ads popped up on my Cuff all morning, layering on top of each other with what felt like pent-up eagerness, reminding me of what I had lost. I ignored them. I didn’t have to look at them, just like I didn’t have to speak. The only control I had was over those few things I could choose not to do.

  I barely let myself think about what might have become of Beecher’s grandmother. It sickened me to imagine what would happen when they discovered her Cuff in its half-burnt state. Would they hold her liable for all those years? What could they prove? What punishment would they offer worse than the prison her freedom had made?

  There was nothing I could do about it. I only had one path available to me now, and it led to Malvika Place. I would bring Sam there or, if I had to, I would drag Carol Amanda Harving kicking and screaming back to our home. I purposely ignored the idea my dreams had offered, to kill her, but my heart knew that if she did not exist, our lives would be better for it. My prospects were not good, but I still had my equipment and my Placer skills. I couldn’t reach her roof, but I could smash open a window or, if I was more thoughtful about the plan, I could pry one open.

  My only advantage now was that I had nothing to lose.

  I sat with Saretha all day while she watched one news report after another. I hadn’t noticed that her hair, usually so silky and Ad-worthy, had slipped into an oily and unkempt public domain mess.

  Media coverage of the Silents had abruptly ceased. There were no more reports about Bridgette Pell or me, or anyone else who had gone quiet. It was like we’d never existed.

  “They were covering it all day yesterday,” Saretha sniffed. Her tone reminded me of Mrs. Harris. It was an awful thing to hear her once-pleasant voice sullied by our Custodian’s pettiness. Had she picked it up from that awful woman because she had no one else to talk to? Was my silence to blame?

  I wanted to say her name—Saretha. I’d always liked the sound of it. I couldn’t hug her or console her, and I felt like my body might break under the weight of all our troubles.

  My silence wasn’t entirely to blame. If I’d done what was expected and read my speech, there would still be an ever-growing rift between us. Instead of the words I refused to speak, it would have been the words I could not afford. If this day was before—before her Last Day and paying for words—I would have cozied up beside her on the couch, and she would have hugged me and chatted and given me advice. I would have ignored what she said, or most of it. Saretha always thought she knew best, even if the advice she gave was just repeating something she’d seen in a film or an Ad. I would have been annoyed, but also glad that she was looking out for me.

  Saretha did a search for Silents, and the result came back blank, like the word itself didn’t exist—except, of course, that she was charged a hefty fee for typing it.

  I worried there might be some connection between my being kicked off the team and the sudden change in news coverage. I didn’t think Kel could make something like this happen—she didn’t have that kind of power. But I worried that my actions had triggered something.

  I watched with Saretha, hoping to glean something. I dreaded seeing news of Mrs. Stokes, but when any failed to materialize, I felt more unease than relief.

  The sudden disappearance of coverage was like a coordinated effort to make it seem like the Silent movement had never existed.

  Maybe it hadn’t. I had no idea how many Silents there might have been, or how many might have tried and given it up. It sure seemed like the group was growing. But whatever the numbers, what did it matter? What could we do? None of us spoke, or communicated with each other. Mandett had just demonstrated how ineffective and infuriating the silence could be. The media had treated the Silents like a sinister movement, but none of us could lead. None of us could plan. We could not even say hello to one another. Where could a movement like that go? What could it accomplish?

  I almost had to laugh at the strategy of writing us off. The Media and the Rights Holders seemed to have decided that if they ignored us, it would be as if we’d never existed. I tried to believe that could be a good thing. At least I would be left alone. But whatever progress I’d made, and whatever confusing message I’d sent, would be forgotten.

  * * *

  Sam returned home at dinnertime. He saw me staring blankly into the screen with Saretha and immediately sensed something was wrong. I turned and watched his face struggle, helpless to identify the problem.

  It crossed my mind to bring Sam to a Squelch. I knew where a dozen could be found, peppered throughout the city. I could sneak him in, seal the door and maybe I could tell him everything. I longed for that. Maybe I should give up that piece of my silence, at least for him.

  Sam printed up our meals. He gave me extra Huny®, a small luxury Saretha insisted on ordering, even though we no longer received a sponsor discount. Whatever upset Sam harbored about the iChit™—wherever he thought it came from, and whatever he thought I’d done to get it—he had forgiven me.

  “They pulled the zippered lips from the public domain this morning,” Sam said. My eyes went wide.

  “I wish they’d done that before your Last Day,” Saretha said, a little teary.

  Sam’s face broke into a weak grin. “You must really be getting under their skin,” he said to me.

  “Horrible,” Saretha said. Sam’s head started shaking even before she was charged.

  “It’s awesome,” Sam said, building on his own enthusiasm. Saretha turned. “People were using it everywhere. It’s like—a thing.”

  He didn’t have the word for what it was. Revolt, I thought. Revolution. We were only taught those words in school, in reference to events so old and mythological I found it hard to distinguish between the founding of our country and the labors of Hercules. It was hard to imagine anything I could do would actually be—a thing.

  Sam was looking at me, a sparkle in his eyes. He had not just forgiven me; he was proud of me. I think he looked up to me. I felt terrible for not seeing it sooner. Would he feel the same way if I spoke to him now?

  “I saw Mrs. Nince today,” Sam said to us both. “I almost didn’t know it was her. She got her face resmoothed, but it’s full of pinched lines, like she’s made of old taffy.” He laughed.

  “Probably will have to do that to my face,” Saretha said without emotion.

  Sam’s cherub features emptied of humor and flashed with a hate he was too young to have. I could feel Carol Amanda Harving’s name dart through his mind. I ached to tell him I had a lead on how to find her, but I couldn’t. If I took him aside in a Squelch and spoke, I would betray everything he was proud of.

  Outside, day had turned to night, and I had barely noticed. The screen droned on before us. Sam recovered himself and let his mind drift. The hour grew late, and Saretha turned to me.

  “Don’t you have somewhere to be?”

  “Saretha!” Sam admonished her. She shrugged a full shrug, not the sad kind I could only manage if I held it under two centimeters.

  “We aren’t supposed to notice?” Saretha asked.

  I burst out into an absu
rd bray of laughter. Really? Saretha wanted to bring this up now?

  “It doesn’t seem worth spending the family budget on,” Sam said, flicking her Cuff with his fingers. Saretha slumped down deep in the couch and glared straight ahead.

  She didn’t know it, but she was right. There was no point in waiting any longer. It was time for me to go find Carol Amanda Harving.

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  I had to enter Malvika Place on the seventy-seventh floor. From there, I could travel up through the inside of the building. It was a reckless idea without Kel’s Pad, but I didn’t see a choice.

  I was able to shoot a line from a nearby rooftop to the sixtieth floor, but the rest of the way up was a grueling, nerve-racking climb with suction and magnetic boots. I had to will my hands to keep steady. My stomach was in knots. One slip could kill me, and my team wasn’t here to catch me.

  Kel, I’m sure, would have thought what I was doing was foolish. In a way, it was easier for me to go on now that I didn’t have to think about disappointing her and the team. If it mattered to her what I did, she wouldn’t have drummed me out of the Placers.

  As I peeled one cup off the glass and replaced it higher up, I thought about how Henri would have helped if I had asked. Henri would have done anything for me, I think. I wondered if Margot was glad now that I was gone, and the way was clear for her to coyly needle him until he finally noticed her.

  I looked down at the lines of the building gathering in perspective, far below, and was dizzied by the thought of Sam so high. I couldn’t bring him this way. But I was doubtful I could get through into the lobby. If I couldn’t bring him to her, I would have to bring Carol Amanda Harving to him. Could I get her to our home, so she could speak to Sam and Saretha and see what she had done? I had no idea how I was actually going to manage that without words. I could take her hand and lead her, but it didn’t seem realistic to think she would be led. I could use sleep gas; I still had the canister. It would be far better than the murderous nightmare that itched in my brain.