Girl In The Needle

by Joshua Renneke

  “If you're part of Keti, and Keti can't die…”

  “I guess that means what you think it means.”

  “Then you have to already know that you'll always be different.” He saw the look on her face, and quickly added, “Maybe you can still be part of the outside world.”

  “Yeah,” she said without conviction. “But if I’m being honest with myself, either Keti goes away again, and I go with her, or she puts me back in the Needle. Forever.”

  Dugan stopped walking. “Look at me,” he said. “I want you to know you can believe what I'm saying. This is the only positive lesson I've learned from life.

  “Things will never turn out exactly how you hope they will. But, given some time, you realize that the way they turned out has its benefits. Sometimes it's even better than if you'd gotten what you wanted.”

  “I’ll have to trust that you would know better than I would.”

  He reached over to nudge her, but pulled his hand back. “Well!” he said with surprising cheer. “It looks like the Empress is human after all!”

  “Thank you.”

  “So…have you ever thought about what name you’d want to go by if we…”

  “Yes!” she said without allowing him to finish the question. Her face took on a look of great seriousness. “I like Kayla or maybe Kyra but I also want to look into what names there are that I don’t know. Perhaps I should make up a new name.”

  “You know what you look like to me?”

  Her eyes lit up. “Tell me,” she commanded.

  “Maybe a Becca or Elyse. They're pretty names.”

  “Elyse,” she said softly. “I haven’t heard Elyse. Are you teasing me, or is it a good name for a girl?”

  “Well, I don’t know anyone named Elyse personally…but if anyone should be an Elyse, it’s you, Empress.”

  They walked in silence, the Empress mouthing Elyse to herself but hoping Dugan didn’t notice.

  The Grand Hall was silent other than the soft hum of lighting strips activating.

  Dugan crept through an entrance doorway before it had finished parting for him. He turned to motion to the Empress that it was safe, but she was already striding past him.

  “So you were bringing me to the third Assembly,” he said. “Where are the people?”

  “You’ll see them soon enough,” she said. “While we wait, try to think of a good reason why he shouldn’t kill us.”

  “You mean why he shouldn't kill everyone but you.”

  “I’m part of Keti, but still separate from her. If he destroys what’s left of the planet, I might end up facing a worse punishment than death. Or the Needle.”

  A voice from the stage made them both jump. “I think that’s accurate.”

  A chill ran down the Empress’s spine. Standing on stage was what appeared to be the boy who had shot her.

  Dugan instinctively moved himself in front of her.

  He shouted, “Explain yourself!”

  Makil cocked his head. “Are you not a fan of this body? It is a fitting way for me to present myself. You, Empress, should appreciate that. Keti, the whole which you are a fragment of, made this world a reflection of her own dysfunction and impurity. If you would turn away from a reminder of that dysfunction, you can hardly deny that my action today is justified.”

  The Empress shoved her way past Dugan. “Then skip the Assembly, and do what you came to do. I don’t care to listen to any more of this.”

  She marched toward him fearlessly as Dugan stood frozen in place. Whatever was going to happen, he couldn’t change it. As he watched, her robe flowed out from her and then retracted. Within seconds, it had become a long pitch-black dress.

  The air in the room became difficult for Dugan to breathe. It appeared to be driven out of the Hall by the sheer intensity of her focus. As she ascended the stage to stand in front of Makil, the room seemed to quiver and ripple in her presence.

  Makil looked past her, to Dugan. “You find comfort in her having retained the essence of humanity despite Keti’s ‘interference.’ Do you truly want the lives of so many to rely upon the words of someone who suffers from all the flaws of your kind?”

  “I do,” Dugan replied. “It’s your flaw that scares me. We’re in this situation because your kind doesn’t believe it can be flawed, or that you have anything to learn.”

  Makil nodded. “The outcome of today’s events was decided far in advance of this moment. It is a mere formality to have this Assembly, and bring that outcome to pass.”

  The Empress turned her back to Makil. At that moment the seats filled with a mixture of outlanders, Citizens, and Makil’s resurrected followers. Dugan instinctively turned to look at the entrance. When he turned back, he was standing on stage next to the Empress.

  A murmur of confusion filled the room. Dozens of Citizens nearly fell out of their seats at the sight of adjacent non-Citizens.

  All the lights went out.

  Panicked voices rose above the sound of the crowd. Dugan found himself fighting an urge to flee the stage. He had no place in a showdown between a god and goddess. When he thought of this Assembly in those terms, his involvement struck him as bizarre.

  In the darkness, he heard the voice of the Empress all around him. “You have done your part wonderfully,” she told him. The serenity in her voice calmed him. Keti had chosen him, but for reasons he still didn’t fathom and probably never would.

  A small orb of mottled light appeared above the stage. Its initial flash provided Dugan and the Empress with a snapshot of thousands of faces, captured for a moment in expressions of fear, and shock, and in some cases helpless anger.

  “Our planet,” a voice intoned as vividly-colored land masses rose on the orb. “Ecosystems flourish in the varied environments. In its natural state, our world displays unparalleled beauty.”

  “The goddess Keti awakens.” A tiny dot of dull brown spread outward like ink in water. It left one tiny stain of color untouched.

  “And then?” Makil’s voice rang out in the Hall; its unaccented style was dull, and undeniably alien.

  The spot of color grew until it filled the space above the stage. The outlands and City were visible from above, then only the City, the Assembly’s view racing closer until it had swung around to focus, inevitably, on the Needle.

  Layer after layer vanished from sight until all that was visible of the Needle was its framework and a girl, staring forlornly from a spot near its tip.

  Makil looked above himself stoically. “Keti never demanded anything of you, did she?” At that, he faced the crowd before him.

  “She didn't. Not your adoration. Not your silence, either. Every day you face reminders of her actions.” He paused. “Actions which you should be appalled by. She destroyed the delicate balance of your world, yet you worship her for giving you petty distractions. Is your technology worth more than all else? Can a phalanx of cleaning bots take your minds off the near-extinction of your kind?

  “This is how you act as the representatives of your kind. Beneath a veneer of compassion and social graces lies a ruthless will to survive. Billions dead, but what was there to do but move on?”

  A sob interrupted him. Makil closed his eyes and listened to its soft, ragged gasps and whimpers.

  “Ah,” he said. “And then there is the girl.”

  Above him, the Empress came into view as the Needle’s framework faded away. She placed one hand on the window in front of her. Her features tightened as she visibly fought to maintain her composure. Another sob escaped her pursed lips.

  “I believe,” he commented, “she was looking down at you. Watching you live your blessed lives, and broadcast the meaningless details of your day. But why would Keti’s chosen ambassador act this way?”

  He left the assembled crowd uncomfortably watching the hologram. In it, the Empress pressed her head against the window to see further below her. Her hand trembled; ever so softly, the crowd could hear her fingernails making a ticking sound on the windo
w.

  On stage, the Empress glared down at her clenched hands. The hologram began to distort above her head.

  “Enough.” Her tone was sharp enough to silence their whispered gossip. “If anyone could have done something about Keti’s actions, it was not these people or myself. It was you, who chose to do nothing.”

  A low hum had built in intensity as she spoke. It reached a crescendo powerful enough to shake the walls of the Great Hall. The hologram, which was already breaking apart, spread wider and wider until finally dissolving into nothingness.

  When she lifted her face to look at the audience, the Empress’s eyes were black slits.

  Makil extended a hand, and bowed to her. “Now we will begin the second act of this Assembly. How would you like to begin, Keti?” He said the name with a tinge of affection.

  From Dugan’s vantage behind the Empress, there had been no indication that Keti had taken over her body. A sensation of grief ran through him as he considered the odds of the girl regaining consciousness in a world barren of human life.

  She turned her head to look over the audience from one end to the other, but said nothing.

  “I believe,” Makil said, “that you have something to say to these insignificant bits of matter.” His voice became a chaotic hiss as the last words came out.

  Keti still didn’t face him. “I have upset the balance of this dimension,” she began, though her modulated voice lacked emotion. “The aberration threads itself through the quilt of what you call time.”

  Without Dugan noticing, the lights had dimmed almost completely. He looked out at a field of silhouetted people who were surely feeling just as powerless as himself. Their whispered words added an unsettling layer to the moment.

  Makil stepped forward, ignoring Keti to stand at the front of the stage.

  “Your lives have no value. The same is true of the lives which Keti ended. The only absolute morality, as you would understand it, is this: balance. On a multitude of levels, balance has been disrupted dangerously.

  “To mend that balance, and restore equilibrium, will require a reaction of equivalent severity.”

  A smattering of cries erupted from the darkness.

  “Yes,” Makil said. “There is one clear course of action for Keti and I to take.”

  Keti walked to his side. “Yes. This world must be brought back to a minimal state so that it can heal, and build itself again. New life will one day bloom on its surface, but the era of humanity is a story that now reaches its conclusion.”

  Chaos erupted in the darkness of the Great Hall. Citizens threw themselves to the ground in agony. For the most part, the outlanders faced the news stoically, even remaining in their seats. They had accepted long ago that their world was fundamentally broken.

  The rest of the crowd, those who Makil had brought to life so they could take vengeance on Keti, wasted no time in leaping from their seats to rush at the stage. Makil and Keti stared out as if they were one spirit inhabiting two bodies. As the angry mob reached the edge of the stage lights’ glow, an unseen barrier held them back.

  Dugan dropped to his knees. I knew it, he thought. I knew it. I should have known…

  This state of disarray continued for several minutes, until most everyone had exhausted their emotions.

  “But…” The word came in unison from Makil and Keti.

  Everyone froze. The silence was instantaneous throughout the Great Hall.

  It was Makil who spoke now. “Our kind can only act with the clarity that comes from being an embodiment of balance.”

  Keti turned to extend a hand toward Dugan. “This being, one of you, sees the complication to our decision…”

  “Despite,” Makil added, “possessing the meager reasoning capacity of humans.”

  Dugan looked up at them. What was he expected to say?!

  He peered into the eyes of the goddess, hoping for guidance. The black abyss of her eyes turned gray, then faded to white. She blinked, and he found himself looking at the Empress. Her irises were a rich brown, which he had never noticed.

  “The goddess Keti brought destruction and imbalance to our world because she lacked perspective,” she said to him. “Although their kind sees the underlying nature of reality as clearly as we see the visible world, they can not evaluate their own nature.”

  Makil addressed the Hall. “If Keti did not perceive her own flawed state, and I did not detect it before she awoke, we can not know now if we are acting to bring equilibrium to this world.

  “It is, ultimately, your imperfection that this world needs. You doubt your choices, and question your own knowledge, while we can not. You must be stewards of this planet, for our kind has proven it can not. We will no longer interfere.”

  Dugan felt his eyes begin to sting. “You’re part of Keti. What happens to you, Empress?”

  “I’m also part of humanity,” she said. A tear ran down her face, but her expression was one of relief.

  “What are we supposed to do?” a man yelled from the crowd. “Please!”

  The lights of the Great Hall hummed to life, illuminating the crowd.

  “You have a symbiotic relationship with your planet. Listen to it, and to your own uncertainty.”

  The Great Hall was empty except for Dugan and the Empress. Neither of them could find words to capture the moment. At some point, the distant sounds of life reached them from the world outside the Hall.

  Epilogue

  The Arc’s high ceiling and spacious central area made it one of her favorite places in Ring One. Light poured in from windows so high above that the cleaning drones were nothing more than distant black specks.

  Dugan snuck in the rear entrance, quickly moving out of view of hundreds of teenagers and twenty-somethings who were too distracted to notice him anyway. He stuck to the curved inner wall as he moved to an inconspicuous vantage point.

  “Holy shit!” A girl’s voice echoed faintly before getting lost in others’ laughter and conversation.

  The Empress stood smiling before a half-circle of onlookers who sat watching her with rapt attention. Her hair was pulled back in the style she was known for, but now she kept pink flowers tucked above her ears.

  “Yeah,” she said, “Bytech Anon is kind of my guilty pleasure. I shouldn't like Carlee…but I do.”

  Their hands went to thin rings at their wrists. On a screen at the rear wall, a flood of emojis cascaded over the live feed.

  They excitedly looked down to their CR rings. A jagged line of color circled the wrist of a short girl, who excitedly held two fingers up

  “Is it true that you're friends with the girl who plays her?” she asked.

  The Empress averted her eyes playfully. “Well…we run into each other every few months. I don't know that that makes us friiiiends.” Her face froze in an awkward grimace, eliciting laughter and a new flood of emojis in the background.

  A moment later, a serious-looking boy raised two fingers. He paused to ensure he had the group’s attention.

  “Why do the doctors in Ring Three have a higher patient recovery rate than medbots in our Ring? Can't you just make the medbots better?” Frowning emojis fluttered along the edges of the live feed.

  The Empress held out a hand. “Come to me and be healed.” She raised her eyes to the windowed ceiling. A few girls giggled into their hands. The boy hesitated, unsure if she was teasing him, but stood up and carefully stepped over hands and legs. When he reached her, she placed a hand on his shoulder.

  She looked at his chest before nodding her approval. She asked, “Do you feel better?”

  “I…I think so. Yeah, I feel it. What did you do? Was there something wrong with me?!”

  The Empress glanced mischievously at a pair of girls who were whispering to each other. “You had minutes to live, young man,” she told him. “A serious case of frown-itis.”

  “What?”

  “I didn't do anything to heal you. Maybe now you see why people recover faster after talking to a person
instead of a medbot?”

  His face lit up. “Oh…,” he said. “I think I do!”

  On the wall behind her, a scene from Bytech Anon replaced the live feed. Carlee wore a medvest with a stethoscope hanging around her neck. She held her hands in the air and ominously said, “Come to me and be healed.” Giann hesitated before approaching her.

  While the main lights dimmed, Dugan caught the Empress glancing in his direction.

  On screen, Giann was holding his chest. “You cured me!” he exclaimed. “What was that I just drank?”

  “You had minutes to live, young man,” she answered gravely. “Quite a serious case of frown-itis!”

  “Frown-itis?”

  Carlee shoved his shoulder. “You weren't sick, Giann. All that's wrong with you is guilt about lying to Isac and Soledad.”

  “But I didn't want to hurt their feelings! They're my friends.”

  “And look what happened. They won't stop posting their awful synth-rap songs to everyone’s feeds. You need to tell them the truth before I cut my ears off!” She mimed the act of laserslicing an ear off.

  Everyone in the Arc laughed, including the boy who'd unwittingly played his part in the Empress’s joke. He covered his face with one hand while the lights increased to full brightness. People around him talked over each other to tease him enviously.

  The Empress wisely chose to wrap up their evening there, ending it on a high note. Anyone watching the live feed had their screen hopelessly flooded in emojis, to the sound of loud, boisterous groups filing out of the Arc.

  He had been right, after all: things hadn't turned out exactly as the Empress had hoped, but she still had reason to be content.

  Dugan allowed himself to feel a swell of emotion as he waited.

  When he visited her, she would often pause for a few minutes with her eyes closed before approaching and greeting him. He had always felt that it would be intrusive to ask for an explanation of this ritual.

  Perhaps she was pushing the part of her that was Keti far into the corners of her mind, so she could be present with him as herself?