by Phil Hurst
“I’m not good with stuff like this, Paige.”
“I couldn’t do anything.”
Jennifer took her hand away, “Sometimes you can’t.”
“How many people have you seen die?” Paige asked.
“You can never do anything about it.”
“What are we going to do without him?”
“We carry on with the fight he believed in: the battle for our souls.”
“His agenda sounds an awful like yours.”
Paige stood up and brushed the grass off her knees.
“We’re family,” Jennifer said.
“Your son is dead,” Paige pointed towards more wires that stretched across the garden. “And here you are, risking more people’s lives.”
Jennifer stayed still on the floor, staring at the ground: “We have to push them back.”
“Why?” Paige crouched down next to her. “Why are the URC so bad?”
“Sam was a good boy,” Jennifer said, looking at her hands.
Paige realised her mother was crying silently. Tears slowly rolled down her cheeks, but she made no noise. Paige felt like a fraud. She was attacking her mother for fighting the reckoners while she was on the run from them. Paige didn’t know what she had been expecting when she got to Cromer. Retribution? A new purpose? And what had she found? Violence. Death. None of it was her fault, but she felt like some higher power was punishing her for not accepting her sentence in London.
Paige shook the guilt away. Whatever she was running from, that was in the past. People weren’t dying because of it. Her mother was mixed up in something dangerous. Something that was getting people killed.
Jennifer took a deep breath and stood.
“Why did you come back to Cromer, Paige?” she asked.
“To see you. And Sam.”
Jennifer folded her arms. Her eyes were red, but there was no sadness anymore. Something about her had shifted. “You didn’t come to help.”
“No,” Paige couldn’t tell whether her mother’s tears had been genuine.
Jennifer held out her hand: “I’m saving people’s souls.”
“You know your Unjudged kill people?” Paige laughed.
“You’re talking about the reckoners at the bridge?”
“Lana chopped one in half,” Paige said.
Jennifer let her hand drop to her side before asking: “If they knew who you were, do you think they would have given any mercy to you?”
“What do you mean, if they knew…”
Jennifer crossed her arms and fixed Paige with a stare. “Don’t insult my intelligence, Paige. You’re here for the same reason everyone else is. You didn’t know where else to run.”
Jennifer took a display from her pocket and held it up so Paige could see the screen. It was a small news story on a website dedicated to reckoner activity. Niche. Paige didn’t need to read the story when she saw the photo. It had been taken earlier in the week and showed Paige heading into the court, trying to cover her face from the camera. Two nights later, before the judge delivered his final sentence, Paige had left London.
Paige opened her mouth to reply, to tell her mother to mind her own business. But then Ax started to scream.
Lana ran through the kitchen and out into the garden, looking at the sky.
“We have a problem,” she said, pointing upwards.
In the sky above them, the small black drones were exploding. Tiny flashes and explosions flickered then vanished. A drone sped down close to their heads, with a larger one following it. The larger drone was easily recognisable as a reckoner model from its dark-green paint.
“Where the hell did they get Doves from?” Jennifer asked.
They watched as the drones flew upwards into the sky. Then, with precision only possible through highly advanced programming, the reckoner drone ripped the first to pieces with a burst of gunfire. Debris fell to the ground in the next garden.
“We need to get you inside,” Lana said, pushing them both in to the house. Ax pulled off his headset.
“I’ve set them to land,” he said, “They are getting nerfed.”
“What are they?” Paige asked.
“URC fucking hackbots—Dove class I think. Too quick for me. Too quick.”
He bobbed his head around nervously before continuing: “The operator must be pilled or something. It’s not fair.”
“And what do they do when all our drones are grounded?” Jennifer asked.
Ax said nothing. He looked at the ceiling.
Jennifer moved to the window and squinted as she tried to keep track of a distant drone buzzing by the horizon. “I can’t have the reckoner drones attacking our soldiers.”
“Fuck the soldiers,” Ax said.
Lana placed a firm hand on Ax’s shoulder. “Do as you’re told. Play it sensible. Keep a few in the air. Keep them busy. I’ll figure out how to bring them down.”
Ax switched his view from the ceiling to his shoes. Paige wondered what had happened to him to turn him so twitchy. “They won’t last 10 minutes…”
Jennifer turned and grabbed Ax by the wrists. Ax stared at them, shocked. For the first time, Paige thought he looked like a prisoner. The two Unjudged women looked like they might tear him apart. “Please, Ax,” Jennifer said, her words not matching her tone. “Keep them up there and buy us some time.”
Ax didn’t say anything else. Instead, he plugged himself into the control. Within seconds, his arms were waving back and forth as he sent the Unjudged drones as far and wide as possible.
“They must be coming from the pier,” Lana said.
“You know that for sure?” Jennifer asked.
“It must be the pier.”
Paige looked up. “Let me.”
Lana looked at her with an amused smile. “Let you what?”
“I’ll kill them.”
All she knew was the man who killed her brother was on the pier. She wanted to be there when he was brought to justice.
Jennifer shook her head. “You need to rest, Paige. You’re still in shock.”
“Give me one of your shit old weapons, and let me at them.”
Paige left the room and stood in front of the Unjudged guard. She held out her hands, but he didn’t move. He didn’t even make eye contact.
“You can’t,” Jennifer said, walking after her.
“Why not?” Paige said. “They killed Sam. The bastards on the pier killed Sam.”
“Because I won’t allow it,” Jennifer shouted. Her voice echoed around the house. Even Ax stopped moving for a second, responding to what he probably identified as a glitch in the system. Paige looked shocked and took a step back from her mother. The Unjudged guard took his leave, nervously looking over his shoulder as he left the house.
Jennifer tried to take Paige’s hands in hers, but her daughter batted her away.
“I’m not losing you both,” Jennifer said. Paige saw her mother’s eyes watering. “The next low tide will be at 3 a.m. The beach will reach almost underneath the whole thing, and Lana will lead an attack on the pier.”
In a moment the steel in her mother’s eyes returned. Paige was surprised to feel a little scared of the woman.
“Burn that thing into the sea.” Jennifer said.
“The reckoners won’t wait that long,” Paige said. “They’ll come in and stop you.”
Lana shook her head, stating: “They won’t risk a bloodbath.”
Paige pointed in the general direction of the pier. “There’s already been a bloodbath.”
“Not compared to what will happen if they attack,” Lana said.
“You don’t stand a chance.”
Jennifer put her hand out and showed Paige a small red pill. Lana did the same. Paige didn’t recognise it, but both women were handling it with enough respect to highlight its nature. “Neither do they. If they come in, one word from me and every Unjudged soul escapes them.”
Paige took a step back. “You’d give that order?”
Jennifer’s eyes went wide. “Without a second’s hesitation,” she said. “And the URC know it.”
Paige just stared at the pill. To order all those people to take their own lives. What was wrong with her mother? She tried to find the words to describe what was happening, to rationalise Jennifer’s actions. There was no way. Nothing explained this, other than blind zealotry.
Lana spoke to Jennifer and broke Paige out of her daze: “I need to show you something, Jennifer.”
“Now?” Jennifer asked.
“It could be important,” Lana said while replacing the pill in her pocket and pushing past Paige out on to the street. Jennifer’s face relaxed, and she smiled. Then she followed Lana out of the house. As she passed her daughter, she reached up and stroked her face with a gentleness Paige had never experienced before from her. And with a resigned shake of her head, Jennifer left.
Paige watched them go. When they were out of sight, she sucked in a huge gulp of air. She realised that she had been holding her breath since she had seen the pills. The Unjudged were a step above any anti-Tumi group she had heard of. Why would so many would be willing to sacrifice themselves to fight against a government that promised security and stability for everyone?
She scratched her neck. Her Tumi implant was itching.
Marcus and Kamar and Sam
S am was part of them now.
- So we’re all trapped in your head?
- Our head.
- Why aren’t I dead?
- We are.
- So why am I here?
- We’re not sure.
- Where are we?
They looked around. The head had been dried out and was in a small, see-through plastic container. A clear gel held them in the middle of the box, allowing anyone to inspect the head from all sides without handling or damaging it. The head itself had degraded following its time in the water. There was only a small amount of hair left, but the skin that had been peeling off and rotting was being held in place by the pressure of the gel. The Tumi implant was visible through a hole in their neck. Something had knocked it loose, and a single wire was suspended where they had been decapitated.
They took a moment to take in their surroundings. Someone, with little apparent respect for their situation, had placed them in a bathtub. Everything in the room was white with the exception of a dark blue shower curtain, which was folded with precision at the end of the bath.
- Well we’re not as wet as we used to be.
- That’s supposed to be a positive development? How do I get out of here?
- By here, do you mean the bathtub?
- No I mean your head.
- Our head.
- Our head, then. How do I get out?
- We don’t know.
And they all fell silent for a moment. They tried to understand what was happening to them and what they could do to fix it. Finding no solution, they looked around the bathroom. They looked at the detail in the grouting, the dust behind the toilet and the limescale around the tap. They understood the force that needed to be applied to push the soap off its dish and how much energy would be needed to press the switch to turn the shower on.
By the time Lana and Jennifer entered the room, the souls in Marcus’ head knew how everything worked. They didn’t know why they felt the need to understand that given they had no control over it. But they also noticed they had memorised the organisation of mechanical interactions in the bathroom within minutes.
Two women walked in. One was Sam’s mother, and the other was someone none of them had seen before. Sam tried to scream to his mother, but he made no noise. She didn’t notice. The others all felt the effect of his exertions and expressed their amusement.
- That doesn’t work. Don’t you think we tried that?
“Lana, why do you have a head in a box?” Jennifer asked.
“It’s in a box because Marie noticed this,” Lana picked up the box and turned them upside down. They felt the movement but were unaffected by it. They had looked at the how the lock keeping the box closed was put together and were confident in its integrity.
“What’s that?” she was looking at the small black wire dangling from what used to be Marcus’ throat.
“It’s a Tumi implant.”
“Strange-looking implant.”
“It gets stranger. Remember these things that Ed and Tak made for us?”
“They still work?”
Lana picked up a modified display, which included a strange looking scanner at its rear, and ran it over the head. They looked at the way it worked and the mechanical components. From that, they understood it was a device specifically designed to look for one thing, although they couldn’t see exactly what. The software was beyond their capabilities. It made a beeping noise, and Lana waited a moment before showing the screen to Jennifer.
“Three?” Jennifer said.
“Three,” Lana replied. “Two unknown and one identified.”
She tapped the display again, and the image changed slightly. “Look.”
Jennifer staggered back. She sat on the closed toilet seat before exclaiming: “That can’t be right.”
“Marcus Tumi.”
“Marcus Tumi isn’t dead.”
“He’s not been seen in public for a month.”
“And his head just washes up? With his soul trapped inside it?” Jennifer didn’t look convinced. “This is a trick. Burn it.”
“What?” Lana tucked the scanner back into her pocket.
“Burn it. It’s some kind of trap.”
Jennifer stood up and picked up the box. She tapped the plastic and tried to look closer at the head.
“It doesn’t work like this, Lana,” she said. “You know that. You don’t hang around in your head. You either fly off into the unknown or you get tagged and sucked into The Store. There’s no middle ground.”
Jennifer dropped them back into the bath. The edge of the box dented the hard plastic of the bathtub. They could tell she didn’t understand what they were and that it worried her. She paced across the small room, scuffing the clean floor with the soles of her shoes. After a moment, when it was clear Jennifer wasn’t going to speak, Lana stood in her way.
“Are you not interested at all?”
“I’m not wasting time with malfunctioning Tumi implants and dead people who aren’t dead,” Jennifer said.
“Let me take it to Oliver.”
“You can’t leave the town.”
“What about Ed and Tak?”
Jennifer shook her head. “This is a waste of time. I need you preparing for the pier.”
Lana folded her arms. “I want them to look at it.”
“I need you at the pier.”
“Jennifer…”
Jennifer’s face had scrunched into a scowl. She stared at Lana, not saying a word but withering her with her gaze. Lana dropped her head and walked out the room. Jennifer followed, slamming the door as she left. The fixtures in the room shook.
- She’s a bitch.
- She’s not a bitch.
- She doesn’t understand what we are.
- Do we?
- We don’t think so.
- She said Oliver. Who is Oliver?
- We should find Oliver.
- How? We’re in a box in a bath.
- Well how did you get here?
- You mean us.
- Yes.
- We formed.
- So we get power from forming with others?
- Yes. It takes a while
- So we are one.
And there was no Sam, no Kamar and no Marcus.
- What can we do?
- Let’s try something.
Lana came back into the room with a large camping backpack thrown over her shoulder and closed the door behind her. She moved it slowly, as if the click of the door latch might bring the apocalypse. She took the display out of her pocket and scanned them again. Again, her little display registered three souls. She crouched near the bath and l
eaned over towards them. “Can you hear me, Marcus?” she whispered to the head.
- Try this.
They concentrated on the mechanism in the display, willing it to display a message from them or short-circuit or turn off the device. But it buzzed along with no concern for their efforts. Lana shook her head.
Lana picked up the head and, despite struggling a little with the weight, swung it around and placed it in the backpack. As she tightened up the straps around the back, it went dark for a second. Then they switched their focus and could see outside the bag.
She threw the bag over her shoulder and left the room. As she slowly pulled the door shut, she didn’t notice that one of the taps had started running in the sink. It was a slow trickle, but it hadn’t occurred naturally.
- Was that us?
- It was.
- So we can change things?
- That was hard work.
- Shall we send a message?
- To whom?
- To our mother.
- We don’t know our mother.
- We thought our mother was dead.
- No. She’s alive.
- We think we’re wrong on that.
- We could be.
- We need to understand what we can do.
- OK. Let’s concentrate on that.
- Where are we going?
Lana stopped at the top of the stairs and watched Jennifer leave the house. She then left through the back door, vaulted a fence and ended up in an alleyway. From there, she turned and feigned confidence as she walked through town.
Cromer was quiet. Everyone was hiding. Curtains twitched as Lana took them through the streets. An Unjudged patrol passed them and stopped Lana. A young woman, whom Lana greeted as Marie, led it. Behind her, two men were chatting under their breath and generally ignoring the conversation in front of them. Marie pulled Lana, and them, to one side.
“Are we going to be able to fight the reckoners without our drones?”
“We won’t need to,” said Lana. “We’re going to get our drones back in the air. Meet me at the Hotel de Paris at 10.”
“I need to keep an eye on the patrols.”
“You need to do this more.”
“But Jennifer said…”
“Jennifer told me to sort the drones out. I’m sorting the drones out. And I need you and your archers to do it. Meet me at the hotel.”