“I’m going to go talk to him.”
“To Mr. Chambliss?” Molly asked.
“Yeah. Maybe he can think of another way out of this.”
“That would be so good. I don’t want to hand it all over to them, Sam.”
I didn’t, either, but it was hard to imagine Mr. Chambliss saying anything that could get us out of the corner we were backed into.
Turned out Mr. Chambliss lived in Pearl River, which was an eight-mile ride. I had no idea how he would react when he saw me on his stoop.
You know that teacher in the movies who’ll do anything for his students? The one who’ll come over and talk you to sleep at three in the morning because your heart is broken? I’m not him, Mr. Chambliss had said. Don’t bother me after hours, not for any reason. Don’t bother me with your personal life. Don’t whine about your grade. You never knew with Mr. Chambliss, though. He always had this half smirk, like everything he said (and everything you said) was a joke.
He lived in a cut-up—one of those suburban streets where the houses had been divided into three or four apartments with a shared kitchen. His apartment was in the rear right. There was a rusting latticed patio table with one chair tucked under the eave.
I knocked, waited. Then I knocked harder.
I heard a door close inside, then footsteps. Locks clicked, and Mr. Chambliss appeared. His gray Afro was sticking out in places, like he’d been asleep. He was wearing a white T-shirt, white boxer shorts, and red socks.
“Can I help you?” he asked, no hint of recognition on his face.
“It’s me. Sam Gregorious.”
He tilted his head and squinted, like he was trying to place me. Then he broke into a grin. “How you holding up, Sam?”
I shrugged. “I’m not.”
Mr. Chambliss nodded, his smile fading. “I’m sorry about Theo.”
He opened the door wider, then went and plopped on the couch in his living room. I took that as an invitation to follow him inside.
“We were hoping we’d see you at the funeral,” I said.
He waved dismissively. “Oh, I don’t go to funerals. I wouldn’t attend my own if I could avoid it. There were two or three a day during the war. You get tired of them.” He glanced at a framed photo on his desk: a dozen soldiers in white winter fatigues posed in front of a portable building. It took me a moment to recognize Mr. Chambliss standing in the back, his head shaved.
“What unit were you?”
“The cybernetics unit at the Siberian front. We called ourselves the Hero Builders,” Mr. Chambliss said.
“My mom is a disabled cybervet.”
Mr. Chambliss nodded. “That’s right, you told me.” He lifted a bottle of ginger ale from the coffee table and took a drink. “So what are you doing here, Sam?”
I told him everything. His eyebrows flew up when I told him Theo’s death hadn’t been an accident. They rose even higher when I told him about the truth app.
He loved the idea; he seemed downright giddy talking about it. The rest of it—Xavier Leaf, the threats—didn’t surprise him. I turned on my phone and projected what Theo had written onto the wall.
Mr. Chambliss grunted when he finished reading. “He was a perceptive kid. He didn’t have time to learn that this isn’t just an observation about the present, though. It’s always been this way. We’ve never been noble creatures. The noble ones, like Theo, tend to be killed.”
“He thought the truth app could change things.”
“It would sure make things interesting.” Staring off into space, Mr. Chambliss grinned, like he was imagining what that world could be like.
“If we give up, Theo died for nothing.”
His eyes snapped into focus. “Is that why you’re here, because you thought I could help you figure out a way to beat them?”
When I didn’t answer, he nodded. “I’m sorry you came all this way. You’re doing the right thing. Turn it over to this guy and walk away.” He spread his hands. “It’s possible he’s working alone, trying to rip you off. In that case, you could take him. But he also could be working for a major corporation with its own militarized mafia. A lot of companies have them these days. The thing is, you don’t know, and this guy is obviously not going to let up until he’s got what he wants.” Mr. Chambliss pointed at me. “They’ll kill you next. Theo was the brains. Now they’ll go for the heart.”
A truck rumbled by outside. It set a half-dozen neighborhood dogs barking.
“Can you even finish the thing without Theo?” Mr. Chambliss asked.
It was a fair question. The rest of us were smart, but Theo had been Einstein. Einstein, Nikola Tesla, and Eva Kosmanov all rolled into one.
“If we can find his safe drive with all his notes, I think so,” I said. “He was almost done, since we’d gotten the SQUID.”
“Then all you need now is a well-armed private security force to protect you twenty-four seven, and you’re all set.” Mr. Chambliss took another swig of ginger ale. I was pretty damned thirsty after the bike ride, and I’d left my water bottle out on my bike.
Mr. Chambliss grunted as he rose from the couch. He went to his desk, tapped the glass on the framed photo of the shiny, new bionic soldiers. “What you need is a time machine. A platoon of bionicos would do the trick.” He shrugged, the tips of his fingers still on the frame. “Hell, two or three good ones would do you.”
A time machine. I’d pedaled to Pearl River to be told I needed a time machine. If it was twenty-five years earlier, Mom and an automatic weapon could have protected us. Hell, if her legs still worked, she could protect us now.
I looked at the photo, then at Mr. Chambliss, an idea taking shape.
“Couldn’t you repair my mother’s legs? If that’s what you did in the war…”
Mr. Chambliss threw back his head and laughed. “Sure, Sam. You just need to come up with eighty thousand dollars for the parts. I’ll throw in the labor gratis.”
For a second, for one single second, our problem had been solved. We needed protection. Who better to protect us than a war-tested veteran?
“You could always visit the bionics junkyard and get used parts. That would be cheaper,” Mr. Chambliss said, sounding completely serious.
“Right.” I knew better than to fall for it. “They sell eyeballs by the pound.”
He raised his eyebrows. “You’ve been there, then?”
I wasn’t in the mood for Mr. Chambliss’s joking. “So where do used parts go when their owners don’t need them anymore?”
Mr. Chambliss pointed at the floor. “Into the ground with their owner. Can you imagine Uncle Sam showing up at the morgue to pull the legs off a dead vet?” He inhaled to say something else, but held it. We stared at each other across his living room.
Mr. Chambliss pointed at me. “You’re thinking what I think you’re thinking, aren’t you? Forget it.”
The parts I needed were buried in the ground. I could search obituaries for enhanced vets who’d died soon after the war, before their legs had had time to wear out and break down.
Would the others go along? Molly would. She was reading Theo’s writings; she believed in his vision. Boob wouldn’t. Rebe and Basquiat, I wasn’t sure about. Could I persuade Mom to go along? Would she alone be enough to protect us? She’d have to sleep at some point, so I needed to find another disabled vet somewhere who would be willing to throw in with us in exchange for working parts. All before Xavier Leaf figured out what we were doing.
“You already own a share in the company,” I told Mr. Chambliss. “If I can get the parts, will you help us?”
He turned away from me, toward the photo of him and his unit. “Absolutely not. I’d just end up getting you killed.”
“Think of how many lives are going to be lost. If everyone had a truth app, it would be nearly impossible to ge
t away with murder.”
Mr. Chambliss kept his back to me. “In theory. How would you even arm these people?”
“I don’t know. Do you?”
Mr. Chambliss turned, his hands palms-up. “Do I look like I know where to find automatic weapons? That’s what you’d need, you know.”
“I’ll figure it out. Will you do it?”
Mr. Chambliss squeezed his eyes closed. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to get you kids killed. More important, I don’t want to get myself killed.”
“You said the world has always been like this, that the honest people like Theo get killed while the liars thrive. I mean, the money aside—what’s worth risking your life for, if not changing that?”
Mr. Chambliss didn’t have a snappy answer for that.
I held out my hand.
He looked at it a little uneasily. “God, I hope I don’t regret this.”
Before I could even finish, Boob stood, brushed toast crumbs off his jeans. “You’re out of your mind.”
“Boob, sit down. Let him finish,” Molly said.
Boob paced to the door of the diner and back again, both of his hands pressed to his head. He squatted at the end of the booth, pointedly not returning to his seat. “I can’t believe you. You want to go up against these people with your mom and a couple of other fifty-year-olds who fought in a war twenty-five years ago?”
“My mom was a warrior. With her legs back, she’d rip Xavier Leaf’s head off. And for all we know, Xavier Leaf is working alone. That’s what Mr. Chambliss said.”
“He also said Leaf could be part of a well-armed corporate mafia.” There was no one eating in the next two booths on either side of us, but Boob still whispered.
“He also said I’d be their next target,” I said. “So if my body ends up in a ditch, I was wrong, and you can hand everything over to Leaf. I’m willing to take that chance. Otherwise Theo died for nothing.”
“Mr. Chambliss doesn’t know for sure who’ll be next. It could be any of us. Or all of us at once.” Boob closed his eyes and sighed. “No. It’s not worth it.”
I stared off into the diner’s open kitchen, where a graying cook who needed a shave was cracking eggs onto the grill one-handed while flipping a line of pancakes with the other hand. He spun and buttered four slices of toast, dropped two on each loaded plate, and delivered the plates to the pickup counter before turning back to the grill. His movements were odd—quick but simultaneously careful and deliberate.
“When we started this project, I admit, all I cared about was making a lot of money. Now I don’t care if I make a dime. I’m sick of being rolled by the cops, of trying to buy one pair of shoes online and having my credit card charged for fifty. I’m sick of being lied to. So was Theo. He was right—what really matters, what’s worth risking our lives for, is creating a bullshit-free world.”
“A bullshit-free world,” Boob said. “Sounds nice until you think about that poker game. Ten minutes with that thing and we’re at each other’s throats.”
I watched the cook, marveling at his efficiency. It was my idea to meet here. It had been months since any of us had eaten out, and it might be the last time we’d be safe being out in public if I got my way.
“Even if we agreed to do this—and I don’t think that’s a smart idea—how would we finish the prototype?” Basquiat asked. “We don’t know where Theo’s safe drive is.”
“I know where it is,” Rebe said matter-of-factly.
Everyone turned. Rebe was staring at her plate, her face hidden by her long, straight hair.
“How?” Molly asked.
Rebe shrugged. “He told me. I think it was Theo’s idea of a romantic gesture. He had a crush on me.”
“Why didn’t you tell us?” Basquiat asked.
Rebe pushed her hair out of her eyes. “That Theo had a crush on me?”
“About the drive.” Basquiat didn’t even crack a smile.
She thought for a moment. “I guess I wasn’t ready to give up hope. I would’ve told you in a day or two.”
I had my doubts about Rebe’s crush theory, but whatever Theo’s reason, we had the drive. That was one obstacle out of the way.
Rebe looked around. “What do we do? Do we vote?”
“No. You can’t put our lives up to a majority vote.” Boob raised a hand. “And don’t tell me I can quit if I want. It’s not like you can call this guy and tell him who’s in and who’s out.”
“Well, you don’t get to decide for the rest of us, that’s for sure,” Rebe said. “Voting is the fairest thing.”
“If we do this, we’re going to have to stay together, out of sight, day and night,” I said.
“Sounds kinky,” Rebe said.
“I’m serious. Until the truth app is on the market.”
“What about my mom? I’m not sure she’s okay on her own,” Molly said.
“She can stay with us,” I suggested.
Molly shook her head. “She wouldn’t leave our house. Maybe our next-door neighbors could look in on her.”
The vote was three in favor, one against. We looked to Basquiat, who hadn’t voted.
“I think this is a risky idea. But if this is what most of you want to do, I’ll get behind it.”
“Speaking of which”—I pulled the cemetery map I’d printed out of my back pocket—“I need someone to help me get the parts for Mr. Chambliss to repair my mother.” The cook was delivering three more plates to the pickup counter as I unfolded the map. As he turned, his eyes caught the light, and I glimpsed a flash of silver. Suddenly I understood why his movements were so deliberate: he was blind. He was a war vet like Mom, except his eyes were broken instead of his legs.
* * *
—
With the gang on board, it was time to approach my mom. I practiced my speech, nervous and uncertain whether her protective side would curl in or lash out. I tried to imagine her interruptions and questions. But when I gave my speech, she heard me out without uttering a word. When I finished, she said exactly six.
“Go get me some damned legs.”
In the movies, graveyards are secluded places, which makes grave robbing a simple matter. Saint Peter’s Cemetery sat on a grassy slope along Route 9W, right in Haverstraw.
Basquiat and I ducked from one headstone to another like soldiers under fire, until we reached a maintenance shed a hundred feet from the road. Vehicles rumbled by every minute or so, even at two a.m. The curfew didn’t apply to people heading to or from work.
“Which one is it?” Basquiat asked. I hadn’t expected him to be the one to volunteer to help, but in retrospect, Molly, who believed in ghosts, wasn’t going to, and Boob certainly wasn’t going to. That left Rebe and Basquiat.
I flicked on the little flashlight and consulted the map. Emma Marshall’s grave was to the right of us. Carefully, I counted headstones.
I pointed. “Third row in from the path, fifth headstone from the left.”
Basquiat motioned. “After you.”
I waited for a truck to pass, then sprinted to the headstone, shovel in hand, and dropped behind it. Basquiat joined me a moment later.
“How do we do this?” he asked.
“One of us digs, the other watches the road. As soon as the watcher sees headlights, he calls ‘down,’ and we both drop until the vehicle passes. When the digger gets tired, we switch places.”
Basquiat pulled the crowbar out of his pants and dropped it in the grass. He picked up the shovel. “All right, then. Let’s get your mom some legs.”
Behind me, the shovel hit the ground, and Basquiat cursed. “The ground is like concrete.”
“Lovely.” We’d biked and walked for two hours to get here, most of it through dark woods to minimize our chances of being picked up by the police for breaking curfew.
Basquia
t handed off the shovel after digging down about six inches. It wasn’t so much digging as chopping the ground with the shovel blade, then scooping away what we’d managed to chop loose. After about twenty minutes of this, blisters were forming on my palms. I handed the shovel back to Basquiat. It was still awkward between us, but not as bad as it had been. He and Molly never acted like a couple around me, and that helped me ignore the truth of the situation somewhat.
Basquiat tossed a shovelful of dirt from inside the hole and paused. “This is creeping me out much more than I thought it would. Will she be just a skeleton?”
“After twenty years? I think so. A skeleton in a dress.”
Basquiat covered his eyes. “A dress. I don’t want to see this.”
I couldn’t agree more. It was one thing to imagine digging up a grave, another to actually stand in a hole that kept getting deeper, knowing that any time now, you were going to hear the thunk of the shovel hitting a coffin.
Basquiat stopped digging. “This makes me think of Trina.”
The words would have been disturbing in the light of day, let alone while digging in a graveyard at night. “I hadn’t thought of that. Rebe should have come instead of you.”
Basquiat never talked about Trina. I still remembered the day he came back to school after the accident, climbing onto the bus and dropping into the seat beside me. He turned and asked me about assignments he’d missed. We were eight; Trina had been four. At her funeral, Basquiat had been like a zombie, sitting on a bench near the grave, wide-eyed and absolutely still, hands in his lap where his mother had placed them.
Basquiat went back to digging. Even from where I was squatting, I heard the thunk.
“Your turn.” He held the shovel toward me.
“Oh, gee, thanks.” I accepted the shovel and slid into the hole, taking a small avalanche of dirt with me.
It looked like a nice coffin. It was reddish in the light of the flashlight, and might have been cherry, although I wasn’t much on identifying woods. I didn’t know why Basquiat had brought the crowbar. I’d pictured wooden slats like in old westerns. We dug footholds and clung to the sides of the hole—which sloped outward rather than straight up and down—because we couldn’t open the casket while standing on it. I reached down to open it, and realized I was on the wrong side.
The Future Will Be BS Free Page 7