by Beers,David
No specifications exist now, and even with The Reckoning, The Genesis hasn’t started taking large groups yet. Mrs. Owen said she had heard of others, that she found them on the Network. She spent the previous night in a fit of uncontrollable tears, but during brief moments of clarity, she started searching.
She found The Genesis is taking others, too, all over the world, though the numbers appear to be small.
So what was different about Michele Owen?
Nothing as far as she could tell. The girl was a normal fifteen year old: went to school, did well, had friends, a few boyfriends though nothing serious. She did her Scan two days before and then the applications showed up. They simply opened the door and marched in, taking the girl, without any words exchanged. Both parents followed them down at first, though by the time I arrived, Mr. Owen had gone back in to find his weapon.
The woman has nothing left. Her parents are in another city-state and her child and husband are dead.
But why?
Something is happening here and it doesn't make sense. If The Genesis is going to eliminate as many as Caesar said, they cannot possibly do it one by one like that. The original purge took people out in the streets and made examples of them. Millions of people. They made no example here; in fact, they did this more in secret than in public. The applications did nothing to endanger anyone, or make a scene really--not until Mr. Owen started firing.
Secrecy.
After the Scan.
I wonder if Marty is telling me everything. I know he doesn't have to and I also know that he'd keep things from me if The Great and Holy Caesar commanded it. Yet, I also know that Caesar has given me everything I've wanted, even at my own detriment.
Will Marty help me? My last purpose in life was simply to live, and now I think I might have found another, because death is on the way. Simply living won’t cut it anymore.
Caesar was right. The madness is coming back. Not just what happened in the lobby, but the dreams are worsening. They're happening more often and while I can handle those, I know I can't when they venture into reality.
And they’re coming.
I can feel it.
Chapter 21
"Marty, what aren't you telling me?"
The machine turned and looked at Leon. It thought of itself as a he, programming that Leon asked for. Marty understood that Leon had wanted--and needed--some form of companionship--which led to his intense involvement in Marty's creation. Marty, whether Leon would admit it or not, was his only friend.
"About what?" the machine asked.
"What happened on the street. Mrs. Owen and her daughter."
Marty walked over to the window and pulled open the curtain. "Can we please leave here? This is just the worst view I've ever seen." He stared at a brick wall, another building right next to their hotel.
"Don't change the subject."
"I'm not. I need a different view, but as usual, you're only concerned with your wellbeing."
Marty, clearly, was changing the subject. He didn't want to go down this route with Leon. In fact, Leon shouldn't be doing anything like this--his own private investigation into a matter that had nothing to do with either of them. Leon could get hurt, and the further he pushed, the greater that likelihood became. Those machines would have killed him just as they did the other man. Their purpose consisted of taking that girl and anything in the way would be eliminated.
"What aren't you telling me?" Leon said again.
"I think I could have protected you the other day, if you somehow got involved with those applications. But I only think that. I don't know. They might have killed you before I could disable them. I can't allow that to happen."
"You still haven't answered my question. I want to know what you're hiding. This is important to me."
"Why?" Marty said, though he thought he knew. Leon found Marty a bit strange, a bit annoying--Marty knew this--but he understood Leon on very, very deep levels. He was Leon's doctor, nurse, and psychologist--though many of those words had fallen from the human lexicon, Marty knew them.
"You tell me and I'll tell you. You first," Leon said.
Marty shook his head and then turned around. He stepped forward, standing in front of Leon's usual place on the bed. Marty would have terrified any other human that saw him standing like this, but Leon didn't flinch.
"I'm not hiding anything from you. I don't know what is happening and I don't want to, because you would nettle me until you got it out. I don't want you having anything to do with this. I don't have anything to say other than what I already have."
"Good," Leon said, looking up from the bed. "I believe you. Now to answer your question, this matters because The Genesis is up to something and I want to know what."
"Why?"
"Because I want to stop it."
Marty sighed, a human trait imbued by Leon. "What have you ever stopped from happening? Anything The Genesis wanted, it made so ... what do you think you can do here besides die?"
"You've seen my dreams? What's starting to happen?"
Marty nodded.
"Then you know I'm dying. Cancer of the mind, maybe--not the brain, but my actual mind. So stop talking about my death, because that's coming. Caesar already told me as I'm sure he told you. The only way to stop it from happening is by going back to the mansion, which you don't have the authority to do because Caesar let me leave. However, you can help me find some purpose while I'm still alive."
Leon stood up so that he was a few inches from Marty.
"And I know I haven't made a piss of a difference in this world. But, I've tried, and I'm going to keep trying. Are you going to help, and before you answer, I want you to know how serious I am. If you say no, I'll have Caesar give me someone who will. You've seen how he feels about me and you know he'll do it, because he'll think I'm as harmless as you do. So unless you want to die with The Reckoning, I suggest you get on board."
* * *
All the wiring felt connected, though Jerry didn't know how sturdy any of it was. He could stand up and a major connector might simply fall out of place, and he'd collapse to the floor, dead--which in a lot of ways was preferable to this. Standing up didn't mean anything. He was still blind, with no way to fix it.
Yet, he was further along than he had been in five hundred years, and that was something, wasn't it?
Yeah, old man, what are you going to do if you can actually stand up? Are you going to lead another revolution against your failed savior? Haven't you had enough of that, the blind leading the blind, though this time you'll see even less--if that's possible.
Jerry laughed, a rusty sound. His mind's disbelief felt good, more energy than he'd felt since ...
Since you met Caesar.
The laugh died.
"Fine," he said. "Fine. Keep being depressed about him and see how far that gets you."
There wasn't a lot else to do besides stand up, though Jerry kept putting it off. He'd been ready for some time now, though he didn't have any idea actually how long. Time was endless and Jerry was time's twin brother--neither of them mattered because both went on forever.
If he stood up and died, or worse, collapsed without being able to die, all of this ended. He dedicated so much focus to using the tiny bit of current he possessed and fixing his wreck of a body. In doing that, he found pleasure, the first in a long, long time. If he stood and this failed--Jerry hoped he died because he couldn't handle any more of an invalid’s life.
"Get it over with, old man. Stop all your chatter."
He nodded, the movement feeling better than he could ever put into words.
Jerry moved his arms, slowly, placing his hands next to his body, then lifted his feet back so that his knees bent.
Here we go.
He pushed down, his metal muscles wasted and creaky. Loud screeches echoed off the walls as he rose getting his feet more and more under him. He tried to monitor his body as he moved, but at the same time excitement took over. A happiness flooded
him as he slowly stood up, his feet replacing his hands as the driving factor.
And then Jerry stood on his own two feet.
For the first time in five hundred years. An old machine, an old man, a hybrid and the last of his kind. Blind and with no clue what the hell to do next. All of it true and all of it could piss in the wind because Jerry was standing.
He checked his sensors, all of them giving green statuses, though that didn't mean one or all would stay that way--red could erupt at any second and his body would give up all its strength in one rusty fall.
"So be it. What's next, old man? Any other tricks you can pull?"
* * *
Caesar watched Jerry rise. He couldn't be amazed any longer, but a very pale version of that word described what he felt looking at his mentor stand. Jerry's body was ragged, metal protruding from all parts, flesh ripped and nearly mummified.
Caesar looked inside Jerry's body and saw how he did it. Very slowly. Very carefully. Working with the same meticulous attention to detail that he once used to build The Named. He still couldn't see, but had something like that ever mattered to Jerry? He would crawl his way across the world to kill The Genesis.
Another pale emotion rose into Caesar's mind--The Genesis's mind: pride.
What are you going to do about it? Grim said, thrusting into Caesar's thoughts.
Him or the pride?
Him, obviously. Your human emotions, while nagging, don't matter.
I don't know, Caesar said. I never saw this coming.
There's quite a few things we haven't seen coming lately, none of them good. Did you do it on purpose? Leave that charge there when you last visited?
You already know the answer to that. No. The machine I use to talk to him is old and should probably be recycled.
Grim left and Caesar felt no notice of Gay at all. He liked the names he gave them, they seemed apt to their predisposed personalities. And he supposed, in a weird way, he perfected their two sides, bringing a moderate personality that both lacked.
Jerry still stood, not moving.
What are you going to do, old friend? Caesar wondered. Where do you want to go?
He knew both Grim and Gay disapproved of his emotional ties to those from his past, the soft places he held for each of them.
Maybe do a little good here, then.
He could if he wanted, but what would the consequences be? He couldn't risk anything he was currently worked on; his decisions were made and final--anything that might disrupt them wasn't acceptable.
Caesar left Jerry for the moment, letting his thoughts run through possible permutations until he came to a conclusion. The math and logic flowed from him like water down a stream, easily, with complete confidence in the process. The Genesis--He--was made for logic just like water for that riverbed.
And yet, they were missing things: Grim was right.
He would understand better what was happening with the abnormal DNA after today’s tests, but none of them had seen this as even a fractional possibility. And yet, here it was.
Everything he saw with Jerry ended in Jerry’s death--final and complete, which was really what Jerry longed for if he couldn't defeat The Genesis.
Different paths showed different ways to his death, but each ended in the same way. So what would be the harm in it? Why not give Jerry his freedom and a friend to go with him?
The harm is if you miss something. You can't know for certain you're not. You can't even put this DNA problem into your calculations because you don't understand it. That could throw everything you're doing out of whack.
Caesar looked at the old hybrid standing there, not moving, but a twisted grin on his face--the only kind Jerry could make.
It seemed that chaos had been thrust on The Genesis. Chaos in a world that the three of them wanted to rule with logic and certainty. Even the machine which left a charge inside Jerry was just another red ray of chaos in an otherwise black world--a blackness The Genesis had always peered through with such clarity.
What happened if he let the chaos continue? Certainly nothing worse than the last five hundred years.
And Jerry, the strongest creature Caesar ever encountered, deserved to enjoy a little chaos in a world that had known nothing but certainty for those same five hundred years.
* * *
"Jerry?"
A chill ran across the top of Jerry's back, one of the only places on his body where flesh existed undisturbed.
He knew the voice.
"Is this a trick?" he said, still not fully comfortable with the robotic sound his voice made.
"I don't think so."
"Come closer," Jerry said.
"This close enough?" the voice spoke right next to his ear.
"Oh my, it's you, really? Grace?"
"I think, though I don't know for certain. Caesar said something to me, though speaking isn't the right word. He input some code, maybe? And then I was here. The whole thing was nearly immediate. I woke. Input. Here."
Jerry paused, understanding what that meant. Caesar knew. He had seen Jerry fixing himself and standing up.
Caesar hadn’t stopped it.
"Can you see me?" Jerry said. "Do you have a physical form?"
"No form. I'm exactly as I was. But yes, I can see you."
"I'm blind, Grace. I've been sitting in here for forever and somehow ... it doesn't matter how I guess, but I'm able to move. I don't know how long it’ll last, but here I am."
"And here I am," Grace said. Jerry heard the happiness in her voice. "Didn't you want me dead at one point, though?"
Jerry smiled. "That was when I had a lot of people to talk to. You're the only voice I've heard besides Caesar's in five centuries, and that makes you my best friend."
"We have similar stories--despite me working properly and you being a wreck--so I guess we're best friends."
The banter felt good and Jerry was quiet for a second, basking in it, before saying, "Alright, Grace. How the hell do we get out of here?"
Chapter 22
Caesar turned his attention to the problem.
He had spent considerable time focusing on it already, but nothing he did produced any results. He looked at the girl lying on the bed and knew she was the right choice. He'd made a lot of choices based on his gut lately, but he was sure about this one. He needed a specimen whose mind wasn't capable of logical thought or planning. When the specimen went through a second scan, it needed to basically be a mindless robot, simply following orders. That way anything that happened with the DNA would be solely the DNA's work, not the specimen's.
The girl he saw now had very little mental thought moving through her. They tested her body for any genetic abnormality but found nothing. Caesar had looked into her past, wanting to understand why her mental capacity had regressed so far: she witnessed her father's murder and now somehow thought she was in a dream state. All of which would keep her inactive during the Scan.
And then with any luck, they would know what was happening.
* * *
Michele's back felt like fire ran up and down it, a live flame that danced across her skin with each step she took. She didn't understand how the fire remained only on her back, not engulfing her entirely, but strange things happened in dreams.
Except, Michele was beginning to think this might not be a dream. You could be hurt in dreams, but not like this. She couldn't recall a single time ever waking up and remembering pain. Everyone remembered fear from dreams, but fire? Flames licking her back?
She was walking up stairs with no idea where they led, trying to walk slow enough to keep the flame from growing. It only touched certain parts of her back as she moved upward, but she knew that it could envelop all of her if she wasn't careful. She couldn't dictate the line’s pace, though, and in that lay the problem. Someone walked in front of her and someone behind, the speed created by something unseen, but no one slowed or sped up.
Michele wanted to walk slowly.
How much have y
ou wanted lately?
A strange thought, one that didn't seem at home in this dream. She felt it was almost mocking her.
How much have you wanted since you watched your dad die?
Michele didn't watch her father die. That was a ridiculous notion--anyone around her knew this was a dream. All of these people were just props her mind built, just like her father's death had been.
It's an awfully long dream, though, isn't it Michele?
How was she supposed to know? She couldn't tell the length of dreams anymore than she could count all the fungal spores in the world. Dreams distorted time, like those mirrors Michele used to be so frightened of as a kid--the ones in the Scare Houses that dwarfed you or turned you into a giant. It left you disoriented and--
Stop. Look around you, Michele. Your mother didn't raise a bumbling idiot.
Her mind quieted. Both the mocking voice and her incessant thoughts telling her that she lived in a dream.
Michele looked around for the first time since she watched her father's brains pop out the top of his skull. She turned her head to the right, trying her best to see over her shoulder. An old man walked behind her, his eyes staring straight at her back.
You can see his eyes, can't you? the voice asked.
And she could, in great detail, even with the staircase's darkness dominating. She shouldn't be able to see the color of someone's eyes inside a dream, not like that.
Her back wasn't a fire pit, either--not when she focused on it. The pain she felt ignited when she moved a certain way, with specific parts flaring up, but only because her skin had moved.
You didn't lay down on fire, Michele. You laid down on something that stabbed you. You're feeling the wounds.
Fire could dance across someone's back in a dream without eating them alive, but in real life? She would be a smoldering pile of flesh and bone within five minutes.