Upgraded

by Peter Watts

  “Wait!” At Mac’s croak, Zeb paused, light winking from the green glass covering his eye. “I’m sorry.”

  Zeb grunted; he waited for Mac to catch up.

  The wall gleamed in the late apricot light. All his will concentrated on not collapsing, Mac dragged himself to the way station door where Zeb waited. Two double-wide trailers, hollowed out and laid on their ends, had been soldered with hooks to fit a bar attached to a keypad with a red, blinking light. Zeb tapped in a code.

  The light turned amber, then green; the bar rose. The double-wide trailers swung open, and the junkyard opened to them.

  “Don’t get much trade these days. Still, got a few bits around as might be useful. Build up more in my spare time. Gotta keep busy.” The door swung shut. The encircling walls layered shadows thick between the piles of junk, and the air seemed colder.

  “You’re all alone?” Mac asked, trying focus on something other than panic and pain.

  Zeb shrugged. “Most days. Sit before you fall down.”

  He pointed to an oil drum, sawed in half to make one of a pair of seats next to an ash-filled fire pit. Mac lowered himself, careful not to over-balance.

  “Palace guard?” Zeb spoke over the rattle as he hauled open the drawer of a battered filing cabinet standing beside the nearest junk pile. If there was order in the chaos, Mac couldn’t see it.

  “Not anymore.” Mac’s throat tightened. “I . . . I tried to save the prince. She refused to leave the palace.”

  Mac shook his head. The ache filling the hollow space behind his eyes colored like a bruise. The prince’s eyes, the stubborn set of her jaw. She’d never believed in her own mortality. She’d built the wall her father had spoken of all her life, filling her head with it until it became her dream, and she believed it would never fall. And because the wall had filled her world, she’d never thought to look to the people inside it for signs of danger.

  Mac’s throat worked, aching as he tried to swallow the salt-taste of memory. He’d believed in the prince’s vision, stopped his ears when his sisters and brother had called the prince’s regime unfair, pressed literature into his hands, invited him to their meetings, held in secret places far from the palace’s prying eyes.

  He told himself their lives weren’t his. They’d always had their own world, their own shared language and memories. Mac was the intruder, the latecomer, blooming his mother’s belly, and breaking into their established, closed world.

  But they were family. And he’d offered no bribes, done nothing to stay the hangman’s noose. For what? The prince’s softening waist, the seed planted in her belly she wouldn’t even confirm was his, the child growing inside the body she didn’t believe in, preferring to see herself as incorruptible, immortal, inhuman?

  Zeb slammed the drawer, and opened the door of a scarred, wooden object that might once have been a wardrobe. Mac caught a glimpse of limbs, stripped of skin, only metallic bones—gold, silver, and copper—hanging from hooks. His gaze went to Zeb’s own mechanical leg. It bent the wrong direction. The discrepancy, one flesh knee facing forward, one metal knee bending back, gave the old man an odd, rolling gait, but it didn’t slow him down.

  “Ha!” Zeb emerged from the cabinet with an arm. He squinted, holding the appendage in front of him, assessing Mac. “This looks just your size.”

  Zeb shut the cabinet door, but it bounced open again. Something tumbled out, rolling to a stop against Mac’s foot, a skull—emptied of eyes, lips, nose, mouth—everything but the silvered teeth and servo-powered jaws.

  Mac kicked it away, the trembling he’d only just gotten under control threatening to start up again. He’d seen a trader come to the city once with a golden arm, wanting to sell armor to the prince. When Mac had asked, the prince told him the limbs were common during the war, before the wall. She’d waved further questions away, impatient.

  The thought of metal joined to his flesh left cold sweat slicking his skin. Mac’s head buzzed. Zeb’s lips moved, but Mac couldn’t hear him. The only thing was the roar of blood in his ears, the high-pitched ringing in the wake of the cannon that had taken his arm.

  The world tilted out from under him, taking with it the smell of charred flesh, and a hand that no longer existed—phantom fingers scrabbling over marble, reaching for the prince sprawled upon the palace steps, braids spread around her head, the medals covering her uniform winking with reflected flame.

  “That should do you.” Zeb’s face leaned into his again.

  “Liana?” The name slipped, unbidden, from Mac’s lips. He could clearly see Zeb leaning over him, but it was his sister’s eyes, so like their mother’s, peering anxiously at him. It was her hand touching his fevered brow.

  Mac tried to push him away, but again, his hand didn’t move. His whole body refused motion, sleep-drugged, blood thick with whatever Zeb had given him to keep him under.

  “Li, I’m sick.”

  Zeb frowned. “It’ll wear off soon.”

  Doubled behind Zeb, Liana hushed him. She took Mac’s right hand, the missing one, humming a lullaby he remembered from when he was a child. Mac swallowed, his throat raw. He tried to close his eyes, but they were already closed. Had Zeb poisoned him? Why couldn’t he think straight?

  “Li?”

  But, no. Li was dead. Trin had spit on him, and called him a traitor. Cal had refused to look at him. Only Liana, who had their mother’s eyes, looked at him square on, and whispered why?

  Why? The crows echoed the call: why, why, why—opening their rusty beaks, shaking their midnight wings, fixing Mac with eyes the color of dried blood. Why. And below the crows, three bodies swung from the prince’s gibbet, turning slow.

  Mac’s ragged throat opened, repeating the question through lips that felt bruised and swollen. “Why?”

  Zeb cleared his throat, looking away. Mac blinked. Liana no longer stood behind him.

  Pain edged in as the confusion cleared. Mac struggled to focus. “Why are you helping me?”

  “Soldiers gotta watch each other’s backs.” Zeb shrugged, still not looking at Mac. “Can you sit up?”

  Mac reached out with his right hand, deliberate this time. It didn’t move, not even the phantom sensation of motion. Mac rolled his head to look. Metal joined his burned shoulder, the slick scent of oil replacing charred flesh. It was dim enough, the sun having set, Mac could only just make out the pipe—mimicking bone—and the greased joints, mimicking ball sockets, trailing from his shoulder.

  “What did you do?” Mac tasted rust and blood at the back of his throat; his voice grated accordingly.

  “It’ll take a bit of getting used to.”

  “The fuck?” Mac’s tongue stuck thick to the roof of his mouth.

  “That gratitude again.” Zeb brought his gaze back to Mac’s, expression sour. Something lay tucked beneath it, something Mac couldn’t quite read.

  Mac focused on the metal arm again, willed his fingers to move. The silvered joints, just visible by the plum-colored light, disobeyed. Weight dragged his shoulder, pinning him to the ground.

  “Some of it’s rust. Most of it’s dead weight. We’ll get you a ghost, and you’ll be right as rain in no time.”

  “Ghost?” Mac jerked, but the space over Zeb’s shoulder remained empty.

  “I’ll get you something to eat, help you regain your strength. Hang on.”

  Mac heard Zeb rattling around, but couldn’t turn his head far enough to follow his motion. The whine of Zeb’s wrong-facing knee gave away his return. The old man crouched, oddly bent, his good leg stuck straight out to accommodate the backward one. He helped Mac sit, propping him against one of the dented filing cabinets. Mac’s right side listed under the weight of the metal arm.

  Zeb handed him a tin plate, sloppy with beans and chunks of pork that were mostly fat. Mac’s stomach grumbled, surprising him. When was the last time he ate? Balancing the plate awkwardly on his legs, he gripped the spoon on his left hand and shoveled food into his mouth. Zeb watched him, wa
ry.

  When he was done, he handed Zeb the plate. “Thanks.”

  His head felt clearer, he felt stronger, but his right-hand fingers remained dead-spider curled, palm open to the sky. With his left hand, Mac touched the metal. Desert cool. He traced the length of the arm. Fingers, wrist, elbow—and there. He stopped. Ridged flesh met his fingers and Mac pulled away.

  “I need a new shirt.”

  Zeb nodded. He rose, rummaged again and returned with a shirt, clean but not new. “It belonged to . . . Never mind.” Zeb helped Mac pull the shirt over the dead weight of his right arm.

  “How . . . does this work?” Mac tilted his head, indicated the metal limb.

  “You need a ghost.”

  “What are you talking about?” His chest tightened. The word why crow-cawed in his head.

  “A ghost. To power your arm.” Zeb pointed. “Didn’t anybody ever lose a limb in the city?”

  Mac blinked, comprehension lagging. Zeb’s good eye twitched. He dug in his pocket.

  “Tech won’t work without something to drive it. Metal’s metal. Life? That’s something else.” Zeb held up a round of metal surrounding dark red glass, like a lens. “Was gonna do it while you were under, but you woke up sooner’n I expected.”

  “What is it?”

  “Lets you see ghosts. Useful in the desert. You can trap ’em for trade, or just avoid the ones who wanna eat your flesh.”

  Mac’s head snapped up, looking for any sign Zeb was kidding. The old man shrugged. “Some ghosts are hungrier than others.”

  Mac licked his lips. Zeb’s good eye showed sympathy; the other, blanked by green glass, was unreadable.

  “It’ll hurt like fuck, but it’s the quickest way.”

  Zeb flipped the lens, showing the back tipped with wicked prongs. Ghosts. Would he see Liana again? Mac nodded on an out breath. Lightning quick, like a blow, like a slap, Zeb drove his hand into Mac’s face. The metal prongs dug deep, biting skin. Mac yelled, clapped a hand over glass and metal, fingers scrabbling.

  Only his hand didn’t move.

  Zeb touched something on the lens’ rim. A click, and the prongs bit deeper, minute tips burying themselves in Mac’s flesh so the lens stayed in place when Zeb lowered his hand. Stunned, Mac raised his left hand. His fingers met blood slickness, weeping from his cheek.

  “Here.” Zeb handed him a rag. Mac gingerly wiped the blood away. “Come on.”

  Zeb got an arm around Mac, dragging him to his feet. Mac leaned, too drained to protest. Zeb’s wrong-bending knee whined with each step; he led Mac to the double-wide trailer doors and opened them to the desert dust and stars.

  Mac sucked in a breath. Through his left eye, everything looked normal. Through his right, pomegranate tinted and aching from the new lens, he saw. The desert was full of ghosts.

  “How do I tell the hungry ones?” Mac stood in the open doorway of the junkyard. Another few days rest, and he could stand on his own now. More of Zeb’s powder to kill the pain didn’t hurt either, but he still felt unsteady, unmoored.

  “They’re usually faster.” Zeb pointed to where a dart of color streaked over a rise in the ground. It didn’t come, but Mac imagined the squeal of a rat or lizard, caught unaware and devoured whole. “Avoid those ones. The rest’ll leave you alone.”

  The ghosts looked nothing like the shade of Liana he’d seen over Zeb’s shoulder. She’d been fever-born, then. Still, she was out there somewhere, wasn’t she? Cal and Trin, too. And the prince. Mac scanned, as if he might catch sight of something familiar, something to set one twist of light apart from the rest.

  Most ghosts simply floated, like thermal currents, drifting above the desert floor, curls of plum-colored and dark pomegranate energy, visible only through his right eye.

  “You get used to it.” Zeb’s spoon scraped over the last of their meal, what Mac assumed was burnt squirrel, but was afraid to ask.

  “So how do I catch one?”

  “Gotta find something they want.”

  “Like what?” Mac turned. Zeb rose and rooted in the nearest pile of junk.

  “Something like this.” Zeb held up a doll—bald, its fired-clay skin cracked, one eye missing, the other rolled back unsettlingly in its skull. From the black hole of the missing eye, a stream of ants threaded down the doll’s cheek, indignant at having their home disturbed. The idea of catching the ghost of a little girl who would covet a doll like that turned Mac’s stomach.

  “I’ll find something.” Mac picked a different pile, nudging it with his toe, shifting bottles, broken pottery, foul-smelling sacks with splitting sides.

  “Suit yourself. Try that drawer there.” Zeb tossed the doll aside and pointed. “Once you find something, you gotta season it with something else a ghost would want. Strong tastes work best—whiskey, if you can get it, spices. Gotta be careful, though. Stronger tastes draw stronger ghosts—older ones, angrier ones who need more help to remember flavor. I have some salt. That usually does the trick.”

  Mac opened the drawer Zeb had indicated, running the fingers of his left hand over a jumble of buttons, spoons, hand-held mirrors, combs and other trinkets. He tried to think of something Liana or the prince might want. An intricately carved wooden flute caught his eye, but the moment he picked it up, Zeb was there, snatching it out of his hand.

  “Not that.” Startled, Mac opened his mouth. Zeb pressed his lips into a thin line, and tucked the flute into his pocket.

  “It belonged to my son,” he muttered, turning away before Mac could say anything. Mac watched the old man’s back for a moment, the slump of his shoulders, before returning his attention to the drawer.

  He picked out a tarnished brass star. Military insignia, but old. From before the city closed, before the prince built the wall. One of the few things Mac could ask the prince about without wouldn’t earning an impatient wave of her hand, was military history. Mac swallowed, his throat tight.

  “That’s a good one.” Zeb peered over Mac’s shoulder. “Might catch a soldier.”

  The old man’s sorrow had been carefully tucked away. Mac nodded, not trusting his voice. He closed his left hand around the star, metal warming against his palm.

  Zeb removed a twist of cloth from his pocket. “Come on.”

  Outside, Zeb crouched and held out his hand. After a moment of reluctance, Mac handed over the star. Zeb set it in the dust, and sketched a circle around it. He sprinkled salt from the cloth.

  “When the ghost comes, just plunge your hand right in. Nature should do the rest.”

  “I can’t move my hand.”

  Zeb snorted. “You got two, don’t ya?”

  Mac’s cheeks warmed. He crouched and closed his left eye, concentrating on his breath and heartbeat, trying to keep them under control. Would he know the prince, if she came to him? His siblings? Nerves made Mac’s stomach flutter. He gripped the dead arm with the living and held it over the circle.

  Swirls of purple and red drew closer, sniffing around the edge of the circle. Mac forced himself not to close his right eye, too. His pulse jumped.

  “There.” Zeb pointed. The glow over the star brightened.

  Mac’s fingers wouldn’t let go. Panic locked him in place. He shook his head, trying to back away, but his legs wouldn’t move either.

  With a grunt, Zeb grabbed Mac’s wrist and plunged the metal hand into the circle. Dust scattered. Mac tried to pull away, but Zeb kept his hand in place.

  “’s for your own good.” A muscle in Zeb’s jaw twitched. “Let it go too long, and the flesh around the metal starts to necrotize. Fore you know it, your whole damned right side will be rotten.”

  An arc like lightning raced up Mac’s arm, through metal and bone, the joined flesh searing all over again. He bit down on a scream, teeth clenched, lips peeled back with the effort. He breathed rapidly through his nose. Metal fingers scrabbled in the dust. They snapped closed on the brass star like a trap, crushing it.

  “What do I do?” Mac strained to move the m
etal hand.

  “Relax. You’ll get the hang of it eventually. Sometimes it takes a while for the ghost to settle. For the moment, your hand has a mind of its own.”

  A fresh wave of panic drew beads of sweat to Mac’s skin. The thing in his arm was hungry, mindless, wild. Even if he could draw the prince, or Liana, it wouldn’t be them.

  Loss slammed him all at once. A deep sound of grief hauled itself from Mac’s chest. He tasted salt, his whole body shaking, save for the metal hand, still locked around the star and pinned to the ground.

  “Here.” Something touched his shoulder and Mac looked up through tear-blurred eyes. Zeb held out a flask. “Won’t kill the pain, but it’ll help some.”

  Mac took the flask with his left hand, fingers trembling. Light from the setting sun caught Zeb’s glass, turning the green gold. In his other eye, damp, Mac saw a mirror for his own pain—dulled by time, but there nonetheless, not healed, never healed, just scabbed over. Zeb nodded and turned, leaving Mac to his hurting, full up with his own.

  After roughly an hour, and half the bitter contents of Zeb’s flask, one of the new metallic fingers uncurled. The sun had set, stars bruising the dark. Salt crusted Mac’s cheeks, clumsily wiped away. His chest ached, everything inside him raw and hollow. But had no more tears, and he could breathe.

  He stared at the metal hand. It was as though a larger hand wrapped his from the outside, exerting constant pressure. Rills of power ran up to his shoulder and back down again. But with enough concentration, the idea of motion translated along those lines of power.

  Another half hour or so and he convinced all the fingers to uncurl. Mac plucked up the crushed star, fighting the image of metal closing on flesh, mangling skin and bone. He didn’t dare ask the hand to do anything else, just let it trail at his side, shivering with the presence of the ghost.

  Mac slipped the star in his pocket, dragging his weary body back inside. Behind him, the junkyard doors swung closed. Exhausted, he stretched out where he was, pillowing his head on his metallic arm. Minute vibrations made the polished joints shiver and hum. At least if his arm was pinned under his head, it couldn’t do anything unexpected.