The Unlicensed Consciousness

by Travis Borne

  The dripping red covered her legs like hot wax. The blood percolated from George’s gaping maw and his grip on the knife didn’t falter. He continued crawling behind her, slashing at the back of her legs.

  The only way to get away! Fall down the bank. She gave one final pull with everything she had. Then blood jetted several feet into the air, even reaching Jessie. Jessie just stood, frozen, bare-breasted, terror-stricken. George had managed one final stab. And Amy rolled down the bank of the canal, landing half in the water.

  Still, Jessie watched, trembling, shocked, unable to mutter a peep or move a muscle.

  George looked down at Amy’s motionless body, satisfied, then turned to his Baby. His open wound was a flustering hot-hole, gagging and wheezing with inhales, blasting gobs of mucous and blood with each blubbering exhale. He gave her a sickly deformed smile and wobbled side to side dizzily, propped-up like a lizard on his front arms. His unscathed and throbbing jugulars kept his brain online, and his brain kept the adrenaline flowing. Petrified, Jessie watched as each thump of his heart expanded the blood-pumping duet of exposed blue veins.

  Dragging his long pointy tongue, he crawled her way; the swinging red snake funneled most of the blood, leaving a trail. Its end curled and wriggled to airless cursing. His breathing changed frequency to that of laughter, flicking hot blood from the hole with each palpitation.

  Just the sight of it strangled her mind. Jessie gasped and felt faint. Tunnel vision narrowed her sight and she could see only him, dragging himself toward her. She managed to dig deep and root out some hate, and some love, for Amy, and what she’d just done. She saved my life! She converted her emotions into a burst of action. George arched his lizard-like back, watching her rise, gurgling steam from his volcano of blood.

  He too attempted a rise but merely lifted one hand, wavering like a dazed fighter; adrenaline alone could no longer power the blood-soaked glob of meat he’d become. His color turned ghost white, then blue, and his head wobbled in a circle. His lungs gurgled; the pitch rising as his cavity filled with blood. And he could do nothing to stop the sockdolager that was her foot.

  Something deep inside of her had awoken. Really, she’d completely lost it. Unhinged, Jessie kicked until he rolled down the bank. And the tongue lapped like a fifth limb, around and around, flap, flap, slap, flap.

  At the water’s edge, six feet from Amy, he kept striving—for what, he didn’t even know. That unsettling sensation, nausea: it has to come out; the terrible feeling of an upchuck on the way. He managed the lizard stance and pushed up with his front two, one final time, then took a bow. At least a gallon of blood and fluids poured out from the hole, mixing with the dirty water of the canal. With the sudden discharge, he finally collapsed.

  His neck bubbled, head mostly submerged. Only a quarter of an inch below the murky surface the pupil of his unblinking right eye danced rapidly, then stopped and focused. With the last five seconds of his consciousness he saw her, Jessie Star, standing atop the bank, illuminated by the morning sun.

  Dirty and distraught, frantic and out of her mind, she took off running.

  64. David

  Jim sprinted through the hallway to the control room; Rico trailed him; Ted lagged way behind. They’d made the wet run nonstop from the courthouse. Jessie shattered David’s security clearance with her shocking allegations and they had no choice but to take her at her word.

  As they reached the door Rico pressed the COM button. He yelled, breathing heavily, “David, open the door!”

  No reply.

  Rico looked up to the camera. “Open up, David. Chang, open the door!” Chang was the only other on duty. Could Chang be in on it too? No way, he thought. That would make things even worse. Rico tried his override code. It didn’t work. He tried it again but already knew, not good, not good at all. Still, the door didn’t move.

  “David must’ve changed control room status to yellow alert,” Rico said. “The door will remain sealed until reverted to green from the inside.” Worry flooded his thoughts and he started pacing. The camera above the door followed. “No, no, no,” he spoke his thoughts, “the fate of the entire town rests on getting that door open. I should have known better leaving only two on duty. It’s been a long time since anything like this has happened. We’ve gotten way too lax around here—we must get that door open now.” Rico tried the COM again. He implored, “David, please open the door. We’ll work everything out, it’ll be okay. I give you my word, just open the door.”

  Ted arrived; panting heavily from the run, he bent over hands to knees. Disconcerted, Jim looked to Rico and shook his head.

  A stuttering voice came over the speaker, “I, can’t do that, Rico.”

  “David!” Rico spun around. “You have to open the door now, it’s not worth it. Why, David?”

  “I assume you know the reason by now,” David said. “I’ve been watching you all very closely. I saw the courthouse doors fly open. I’d feared she…and she never even…and by the way—Chang is dead.” The speaker clicked off then back on again. “I can’t come out now—not ever.”

  Shit. The three huddled together away from the camera and commenced with desperate whispers.

  “Not good,” Ted said, coming to grips with a dizzying thought. “From inside the control room, he could shut down the whole operation. And the broadcast—we’d be in the dark—and the feed.”

  “Oh, we’ll be in the red all right. Literally fucked,” Jim added, “defenses down, completely vulnerable. I never trusted his beady eyes.” Jim knew the workings of the control room; Rico had been teaching him the systems here and there over the past few years. He also knew how solid the door was; the room was a bunker designed to endure a last stand.

  “Well, we don’t know his intentions,” Rico said. He’d caught the nervous wobble in David’s voice. “He sounds panicked, like he doesn’t know what to do. This could buy us some time.”

  “Suicidal?” Jim surmised.

  “Perhaps, Jim, but if he wanted, and he knows it, he could hold out for a long time. There’s enough food and supplies in there to last for more than a year. And if he does something to disturb the broadcast feed, he also knows that even his time would be limited. The machines would drill day and night and get him, of course after we’re all dead. He’d be the last to go. My guess is—he’s gonna sit tight. We don’t have a choice either way. We must come up with a plan to get the door open as soon as possible.”

  “Is there way to force it open?” Jim asked.

  “That door is as impenetrable as are the walls around it. I don’t think so—at least not—” Rico’s eyes lit up. He stood up straight and faced the camera and said loudly, “David, we’re going to leave you alone for a while. Time to think. Please, come to your senses, and again we promise no harm will come to you if you open the door. We’re all human.” He turned back to Jim and Ted and whispered, “Hopefully that will buy us some time. Come on, follow me. I think I just might have a plan.” Following him they commenced another sprint (after rounding the corner): down the hall, past the bay access door, aside the mood tunnel, arriving at the broadcast room. Abell arrived carrying Lia and met them in the hall.

  65. A Deep Idea

  Inside the broadcast room ten pairs of lenders powered the feed, status: mid green. Things were calm, ordinary. They headed to a workstation behind the HAT and Rico loaded a schematic vector diagram of the town. It displayed the massive wall and its inner structures like a blueprint. He zoomed in on the facility, which enlarged a view of the wall on the east side.

  Jim watched curiously as he’d never seen the inner workings in such vivid totality. It displayed the entire facility, extremely detailed, and was much simpler than Jim had imagined it was, although some sections were locked from view.

  The BROCC was quiet but their frenzied actions expunged its normally tranquil atmosphere. Ron, Devon, and the twins who’d been monitoring the HAT, approached and Ted quietly informed them of Chang’s death, furthermore David’s
takeover. The entire group, now quite distressed, expressed a moment of shock and sadness. Ted sent them back to their stations. And he had Abell and Lia log in immediately. Rico duplicated the view on the larger screen above so Jim and Ted could more easily see. He pinched and pulled with his fingers above the screen. The 3D view rotated and zoomed in on the facility. And it kept zooming in until it reached the control-room door. Then, realizations. The glowing blue-lined schematic made clear just how impenetrable the control room was, like a vault. There would be no blasting and they didn’t have the necessary tools in the town to cut it open, nor the time.

  “Well, we can’t force it, but—” Rico said, then further navigated the schematic. He went under the control room, way under. Accessible by a vertical shaft or service elevator, it opened up to a cave-like excavation at least a few hundred feet into the earth. A door led to several rooms, the first being the most ample. It contained four cylindrical machines in its center; three were highlighted with green lines, the other with red. The schematic read: FUSION POWER ROOM.

  “No one has been down there since the first survivors were deposited here. The builders put my father, Felix Lopez, in charge of all of this,” Rico said, pointing. “They taught him everything he needed to know before they left. He passed much of his knowledge to me but passed away during an attack more than fifteen years ago.”

  Ted nodded in recollection, sadly. It felt like lifetimes ago.

  “What happened?” Jim asked. His thirst for knowledge piqued. He’d heard vague stories, little else. And he realized how much he had changed as of late: the contrast of his old and new mind. He was curious about the past, and now, of much else as well; unlike the townspeople, who were just running through the motions, mostly. He thought of Amy and the gift she’d bestowed onto the team.

  “The feed,” Ted replied, “hundreds perished.”

  “We allowed the broadcast feed to slip into the red, and for too long. A stupid mistake. The machines jumped at the chance when four of our perimeter defense ships set down. The others spread to fill the gap but it wasn’t enough. It was an ambush—like they’d just been waiting for it. They have the time you know—they’re always waiting.” Rico sighed deeply and continued, “My Papa died that day. He saved many lives, mostly children, rushing them into the safe room. He could’ve stayed safely here in the facility but chose to go outside and help. Many were selfless that day. When assistance finally arrived, more than half of the town had been exterminated. It was the same battle that disfigured Lia.”

  “Why haven’t you told anyone about this, Rico?” Jim asked.

  “It was a long time ago,” Rico said, “and my father was told to disclose nothing, trust no one. It was a rule from the builders, perhaps outdated now. Very few people know much of, anything, which I suppose contributed to our survival up until now. See what happens when we have one bad apple, Jim?”

  He nodded. He understood but craved to know more—later. “So, what’s your plan?”

  “There are four fusion reactors down there—” Rico pointed. “—any one of which can power the entire town, and we know from this three are operational. They are designed to last, nearly forever, maintenance free. There’s a code panel right here. We open this door.” He pointed to a door at the top of a deep shaft. It looked equally as impenetrable as the control-room door.

  “I see where you are going with this, Rico,” Ted said. “At the source we can reroute power so broadcast-room operations won’t be disrupted by power loss. We can also shut down power to the control room itself.”

  “Then the systems should reboot,” Rico replied. “And the control-room door should open after they do, but we will only have a moment before David closes it again. The system does reboot quickly. The plan is, get full control of the power at the source. We need to get down to that fusion room.”

  “I suppose your father told you the codes,” Jim said, “because that door looks just as solid if not more.”

  “Well—” Rico paused, delving into his thoughts. “—not exactly.”

  “Then, does anyone else know the codes?”

  “Unfortunately no, but—look here.” Rico rolled his chair to another screen and starting pulling up records. It wasn’t a moment later that his father, Felix, appeared on screen. Felix Lopez: Lender. Security Status: 1. He was an older Hispanic man with skin that looked like he’d taken the best the sun could dish out. He looked hardened and thin, but strong, as though he could have built the town with his bare hands, and had a thin determined face under the thickest jet-black wavy hair. His lending stats came up next, all high, exceeding Jim’s, but still not anywhere near Amy’s. His head rotated on the screen showing a large vertical scar under the left side of his jaw. And his information completed with: Deceased.

  “A Lender? Unmodified?” Jim asked. “But how?”

  “The strongest man I’ve ever known, a dreamer and a doer.” Rico swiveled his chair to face Jim. “He was the best lender for years in his time, until Amy of course. Before the war, 2024, he hid in a sealed underground bunker—somewhere in this very town, his hometown. When the cleansing was released into the world they were shielded from its changes. He wanted no part in any worldwide DNA modification, even if it was touted to be the greatest miracle of modern science. He would’ve rather died than accept the changes. My Papa, he preached to all of the family—that he had a vision from God. Back then he was very religious. He said it came to him in a dream and told of a great loss to humanity, disguised as a blessing. Anyway, the day after his vision he started digging the bunker with a shovel and his bare hands, right here in this town—somewhere. He told me about his dream many times: a fog blanketed the world and people emerged from it stumbling, expressionless, like zombies. He talked of people losing imagination, their creativity and wonder, their very humanity after breathing in the false savior, and he was right, it did steal our dreams.” Rico paused. “He was a gift to his time. If only we would have listened.”

  “You weren’t in the bunker with your family?” Jim asked.

  “Had I been, I probably wouldn’t be here today. I refused it, in denial of my Papa. I was just a teenager, know-it-all, and surely didn’t believe any religious nonsense or dream messages.” Rico spun back around to face the system and continued, looking at Felix. “I had a very stubborn cancer—it kept returning. The leukemia was finally put into remission by tech of the early 2020s. It would have likely returned after the war, without tech, so, I suppose I did right. That’s my conundrum. I know you see the contrast well now, Jim, life was less colorful for you a short time ago. I was only a few years older than you when it hit, but I remember well. I imagine you have a calling eating at you, ambitions, new desires, and powerful dreams.”

  Jim nodded. He surely recognized his changes and again thought of Amy. He only wished he could have made George understand. He wished, that it wasn’t only in his dreams that he’d beaten him to a pulp. Rico continued scrolling through the files. “Rico, you can log in with Amy, we all can,” Jim said. “She’s gonna pull through—I know it.”

  “She’s very strong, I know she will, Jim. And I’ve thought about just that many times since Ted came to me with the incredible readings. But I fear my cancer would return if I did, and we cannot cure cancer here in our town. In any event, our town would need a new operations manager.” Rico turned to him and gave a single inferring nod.

  Jim knew what the look meant and he would be proud to take the job when and if the time ever came. He thought for a second how he might miss lending, but quickly evaporated the idea. Perhaps he was ready to make something of himself, do something special, different, real, in the real world. He didn’t say anything else, he understood, and Rico continued looking through endless files.

  Ron was at his station, and Devon his, and the twins were managing operations at the HAT. Everything was under control with the lenders, all were sound asleep and oblivious to what was happening. For now, the power remained on and things appeared to be
perfectly normal. Perhaps David was just hiding out, figuring out what to do, scared. Rico had a member of security guard the door, and no new information had come in. Jim glanced up at the cameras. There was a chance David was watching their every move, but at least he couldn’t hear what they were talking about. There was also a chance he was drunk on the stored spirits, passed out…hopefully so. Jim watched Rico continue to dig through countless files, for something.

  Ted pulled up a stool. He decided now is a good time as any to disclose his news. The mention of Amy made him recall it. “I do have some interesting news,” Ted said. Rico was steadfast in his searching and it appeared he would be busy for a while. So, Ted decided to make use of the time. “I had been meaning to disclose our new findings, and then the tragedy with Amy—” He paused, thinking of her, shaking his head.

  “Ted?” Jim said. He was anxious to hear some good news for a change.

  “You have it now, Jim.”

  “Have what?”

  “Everyone who spent time with Amy has been, reverted. They can log in with anyone else, and they will be reverted as well. The clumsy DNA modifications of the past, all erased—fixed. Amy’s—gift—well it appears to be contagious.”

  Rico paused for a moment to face them both. Who wouldn’t be interested with this news? Now anyone could be a lender, a high-output lender. And there’d be fewer lenders needed at any one time. Both he and Jim were astounded.

  “Does this mean we don’t need Amy?” Jim asked sadly. “That she’s done all she was needed for?”

  Rico saddened hearing Jim’s interpretation and his thoughts divided into two paths: one kept searching unconsciously, the other thought of his cancer, how it was bad, really bad: how he had fought it through most of his childhood and was almost never home. He had his doubts about a revert involving himself.

  “Well, there are some variables involved, Jim,” Ted continued. “Amy still has far greater power than anyone. Her stats, as we already know—are off the charts. Yours have gone up considerably, and you do have the power to revert others, but it will take longer. Ron and I calculate about three to four times as long. And I think we still need Amy to achieve the mysterious purple—”