by Various
I slide the goggles away from my face, and my eyes flinch at the bright lights. Pain jabs into my head from the empty place, as if I’ve lost a limb. Fumbling, I manage to dim the lights to the lowest setting. I rub my temples and think about Eddie.
He doesn’t think the absent halos are a problem. It doesn’t bother him the way it bothers me. I hold my arms across my chest, squeezing tight. Sometimes I wrap myself in the blankets like a cocoon, preparing myself for the day, except I don’t emerge a butterfly. I stay a scared, hungry caterpillar.
But yesterday Eddie took the case. He hasn’t taken a case since his wife died. He usually takes the grunt digital work, and babysits me down in archive.
I upload the siphons I’ve been analyzing. When I recall the different causes of death on each case, I run a search of all siphons prepared by employees working in departments outside of homicide and suspicious deaths. Four more appear to be missing halos, making seven total siphons missing halos. All seven siphons are shorter and all seven were from cases in the last six months.
I pin the death sites to a map. No pattern.
I think about what Marty said, that maybe the victims went to hell and didn’t see the halo because they will not be invited into the light.
My first missing-halo case, Sera Turner, was a journalist and a musician. She donated money to a homeless shelter and volunteered at a soup kitchen. Sera should have had a halo.
I pick another file. Michael Benson. Michael was a small-business owner, single, visited a gym regularly, and space-dived once a year. He doesn’t appear to have done anything wrong. Father Solomon says to always assume that someone is good, “lest ye be judged” and all that, so I assume that Michael should have a halo too.
It’s early, but Father Solomon will be awake. He would know why someone would die without a halo. I call. When the video flicks on, Father Solomon sits in front of a tapestry of the Pentecost.
His wrinkled eyes and mouth turn down. “Hello, Howard. You are troubled?”
“Yes, Father.” I want to explain the case, but Eddie warned me to keep it secret. Police protocol. It’s the rules. “What would cause someone to not see the light after death?”
“Has someone close to you died?”
“No, Father.”
The tension melts from his shoulders and face. “Ah, you seek the answer to a speculative question and not a spiritual one.” He adjusts his position in the chair, like a teacher preparing for a lesson. “If someone does not see the light, perhaps it is because it’s not his time and he’s not yet dying.”
The idea disturbs me. The missing-halo victims not actually being dead, their spirits roaming the earth because they have not seen the light. Except the missing-halo victims are dead. Their bodies were processed and deaths documented.
Father notices me rocking and tries to calm me, but I manage to thank him for his answers and concern. He’s still attempting to soothe me when I end the call.
The buzzer at the door reminds me to head out to the trolley, so that I won’t be late for work. I like the trolley; it rocks back and forth, and that keeps me from getting nervous. Ava takes the same trolley.
The morning news projects above the trolley windows. I usually avoid the screens because they make my eyes burn, but the anchor is interviewing Dr. Ennis and Dr. Reg about mind transfers. I bounce my gaze from the screen to the floor before I realize I can focus on the bottom left corner of the screen and the burning is not as bad.
The anchor leans into the two scientists. “Dr. Reg, you’ve begun a new spinoff on the transfer research. Would you elaborate?”
Dr. Reg nods, petting two of his fingers along his jawline. “We’ve been looking into ways to use transfers to cure behavioral and mental disorders.” His voice dips at the end, and Dr. Ennis places a hand on his partner’s shoulder. “I’m sorry.” He continues, “The research is very important to me. I had a sister who suffered from bipolar disorder. She wasn’t consistent about wearing her sensory augmentation contacts and ended her life two years ago. Our research will help so many people.”
I wonder about Ava. She wears her contacts all the time. Why is she still sad? The interview ends before Ava boards the trolley.
“Hey, Howard,” she says.
I want to tell her to call me Howie. Then I remember I don’t have the goggles on, so she’s right: I’m just Howard.
She blows on her coffee. Her breath through the cap hole makes a deep howling sound and I recoil, but she pretends not to notice. Ava never makes me feel different.
She places her coffee between her legs and fumbles around her purse for a small bag. “I’ve been thinking about the no-halo problem.” She applies her eye shadow and lipstick while she talks. “I did some research about the process—” She puts the makeup away and faces me. I dart my gaze out the window. There is too much stimulation when I look at her hazel eyes, and the red lipstick is too intense. She continues even though I’m not facing her. “It works best if we can get to a body within twenty-four hours after death. The longer we wait, the more incomplete the siphon. That could be what is happening to your siphons.”
No. My siphons are different. “The siphons I found were all extracted well within the twenty-four-hour timeframe. And siphons always have halos.” It feels like seven ghosts are all following me, waiting for me to solve the riddle so they can find their light.
She leans forward, and I notice I’m rocking. I try to stop myself but I can’t. I’m a caterpillar on a leaf shaking from the wind. The trolley stops and we shuffle off. I hug my arms to my chest. Maybe I should get the goggles.
“What do all the cases have in common?” Ava asks.
“I put them up on a map. No pattern.”
“Not just a geographical commonality, but socially. Where did each of these people work? What extracurricular activities did they participate in? What gyms did they go to?”
All the questions bounce off my brain. I imagine the ghosts running to pick them up and thrust them in my face. I dodge them, trying to listen to Ava’s advice.
Eddie joins us as we jog up the steps. “You trying to take my case, Ava?”
She grins, and I don’t understand why she’s happy. I wish I had the goggles.
Ava rolls her lips as if she’s trying to swallow the smile before Eddie sees it. “I thought Howard would be on his own,” Ava says. “We both know the captain won’t support the case; there’s nothing to go on.”
“My favorite kind of case.”
Ava humphs when Eddie says this, and he stops her with his arm before she goes into the door. I keep swaying while Eddie continues, “I looked up the siphons last night for social commonalities between the victims. Too many hits to really pin it down. Do you think someone could be editing the memories?”
Ava looks at me.
I cling tighter to my coat while I fix my gaze on the doorway. “The first siphon could be edited. Siphons don’t skip. The other six—”
“Six?” Eddie interrupts me. “Wait, there are seven now?” He blocks the doorway as he faces me.
I flap my hands in the air, thinking about all the siphons without halos, and Eddie is too close. I can smell the gin from last night.
Ava rubs her hand on my back. “Shh, Howard. Calm down.” She glares at Eddie. “Is the interrogation necessary?”
Eddie steps away. “Look, he’s the one who wants to look into the siphons; I think it’s a waste of time. The least he can do is update the case file so I can be informed.”
“He’s not a detective, Eddie,” Ava says.
“It’s not a case. We don’t have a case number,” I say. Then I repeat, “we don’t have a case number” over and over because I don’t know what I did wrong. Why is Eddie so angry?
Eddie talks over me. “This whole thing is ridiculous. I hate working in Digital.” He snaps his attention back to me. “Howard, stop it.”
I stop talking, but switch over to humming. The advertisements flicker overhead so I look at the ground.
Maybe I should wear the goggles now. Today is the sixteenth. Eddie is not in a very good mood on the sixteenth of every month.
Today will be the seventh month Eddie is a jerk on the sixteenth. He will sit in his chair down in archive and watch the unusually long siphon renders from the high-speed train wreck victims.
He shoves through the entry and heads to archive. Ava guides me through the door too and doesn’t say anything. She explains to Marty that I want to learn how to use the case system for some special job down in Digital. Marty shows me the basics while I rock in the chair next to him. I already know how to use the case filing system. Instead, I think about the absent halos and wonder if I should call Father Solomon again. He could say a prayer for the victims. They should all have halos, even if they did do something bad.
As Ava leaves for an appointment, she reminds me to look for similarities. I rework the information I have: seven siphons with no halo; seven different types of death ranging from murder to natural causes; no pattern on death location.
I run all the siphons again for commonalities in the metadata. There are a few hits; most are not statistically significant connections. One connection bothers me: all the victims had mental disabilities or disorders and were prescribed SAT contacts.
I feel the fluttering in my stomach again and this time I grope around in my coat for the goggles and put them on.
I think about the connection and what it has to do with the missing halos. The room buzzes with officers going about their day. Phones ring; a group by the water filter laughs.
The goggles dig into the skin around my eyes. I’ve been wearing them too often. I fiddle with the lenses, pulling them away to relieve some of the pressure. My pulse pounds into the back of my eyes like an angry neighbor banging on the wall to keep the racket down.
I slip down to Digital Archive. Eddie is working, not looking at train wreck siphons.
“They were all like me.”
He doesn’t stop sliding the renders around his holodesk. They move between us like chess pieces. “What do you mean?”
“They all wore SAT devices.” I point to my goggles.
He lowers his hand from the work screen. “Is this why you won’t let it go?” The goggles tell me he is angry because he thinks I’ve withheld information again.
“No, I noticed the connection. After I ran the seven victims.”
“Seven victims.” He mutters under his breath something I can’t hear because my earpiece keeps volume low. “When I only had three that coincidence was not that important, but now you say all seven had SATs?”
“I just said that.” The goggles flash a warning: social mistake.
Eddie ignores my error. “Not enough. We need more evidence.”
“They all had consultations with Dr. Ennis.”
“That doesn’t mean anything yet.”
“We should search Dr. Ennis’s office or subpoena the medical files of the victims.”
He laughs. “Come on, Howard, we have to have more than appointments with Dr. Ennis to get our hands on medical files. They all had different causes of death. How do you explain that to a judge?”
“Okay.” I nod as if I understand, but I don’t. “Okay. We’ll get more information.”
He puts on his coat while heading for the door. He pats my shoulder and I flinch from his touch. I don’t like people touching me when they’re angry. They might hit me.
“You’ll figure it out,” he says as he leaves. Does that mean Eddie is no longer helping me? I could ask him, to find out for sure, but I don’t. I should have known better than to try to talk to Eddie on the sixteenth of the month. Ava will listen, except Ava is at an appointment. I try to remember where she was going.
All at once it hits me: Ava is in danger.
The goggles detect my increased heart rate, and the auditory feed emits a buzzing sound to calm me. I squeeze my arms around my body because the buzzing is not enough. I pace the room, wondering if I should check on her, and decide to call instead. No answer.
I go up to the front desk and ask for her, but they tell me she was due back half an hour ago. Nobody seems concerned, just annoyed that she’s not back yet.
Mary from Accounting has her coat, and her smile is the biggest thing on her face, her eyes squinting to accommodate all those teeth and lips. “Are you ready for our date?” she asks.
I’d forgotten about the coffee date with Mary. “I, uh…” The goggles give me a list of possible replies. “I have to reschedule.”
Her mouth shrinks to normal; she crosses her arms. I ignore the goggles’ interpretation of her body language because it makes me feel uncomfortable.
“Is it okay to reschedule?” I try again.
“It’s fine,” she says, but the goggles tell me it’s not fine.
I leave to find Ava. Ava’s in trouble and I’m like a superhero weaving through the New York streets. Howard would never be able to do this. My goggles give me my powers. Howie rescues children from burning buildings. Howie saves the girl.
Dr. Ennis’s office is on the third floor. In the lobby two security guards step in front of me.
“I need to speak to Ava Jones.” I’m assertive. Howard is never assertive.
“You can’t go in without an appointment or a visitor’s pass.” They block me from the elevator as if I’m the bad guy.
“Let me talk to Ava. I need to talk to Ava.” I try to walk through to the elevator. I wish I had a badge. Maybe I should call Eddie. But it’s the sixteenth and Eddie is being a jerk.
“You don’t have an appointment. You have to leave.” One guard grips my arm and I yank away.
The other guard snaps to my side and wraps his body around me. In the scuffle, I lose my goggles and the lights attack me from above. The lobby music snakes into my ear. The elevator door is too shiny; it opens like a robotic mouth to suck me into the abyss. I scream for Ava.
A woman’s voice shouts, “Let him go.”
The guards continue to wrestle me to the ground.
“Howard? Howard!” The woman is Ava. She’s all right, so I relax. “Somebody help him!”
“Let him go.” Dr. Ennis’s smooth voice joins in.
The guards let me go, but I stay on the ground. The lights are too bright and the music is too loud. I’m in a building I don’t know, in a part of town I don’t know, and I’m Howard again, shaking, rocking.
When I don’t respond to Ava, she calls Eddie.
When he arrives, he lies on the floor, encouraging me to get up. Ava rubs her hands and watches me while talking to Dr. Ennis.
When I get off the floor, Eddie hands me the goggles. “Don’t take these off.”
I want to tell him that the guards took them off, but he’s already in the corner with Ava. She’s nodding a lot and looking at me.
I rock and rock. Through the attempts to calm the nerves sparking around my body, I hear Ava and Eddie whispering in hushed voices. They talk as if I’m not in the room. No Howard. No Howie. I’m a puppy that made a mess in their absence. Now they have to clean it.
“… He would never hurt me,” Ava’s voice cracks.
Eddie sighs. “Are you sure about that?” He pauses for a long time and he uncrosses his arms making his jacket rustle. “No, you’re right. He’s harmless… We can tell the Captain he was worried about you,” Eddie says.
“I don’t want him suspended.”
“They know him. How he is. Nobody’s pressing charges. This is just another episode to the upper brass. Don’t tell them about Dr. Ennis and I’ll take him home.”
She hesitates and rubs her shoulders as if a huge weight has been set there. “No I’ll take him.”
The ride on the trolley does its job to calm me. Before I know it, I’m walking up the stairs to my apartment.
“Howard,” Ava says, clearing her throat. “Eddie told me about what you thought. About Dr Ennis.”
I stare at my door handle.
“Do you think that you might have imagined it
because of a fear of the procedure? When we talked yesterday, I got the sense you were afraid, not really for me, but for you. At the consultation Dr. Ennis assured me—”
“I’m not afraid.”
“But—”
“I think I should get a consultation, too.” I’m sick of being Howard, the autistic guy in Digital Archive.
She straightens. “Well, okay. I’ll set something up with Dr. Reg.”
“What about Dr. Ennis?”
“He does the initial, but I talked to Dr. Ennis about you, and I think we could get you right in to Dr. Reg. They take a scan of the brain, then redesign the parts that are damaged and insert the fix into your mind. I did my scan today. He said PTSD is an easy redesign—once we get approval.”
She takes a deep breath.
I exhale. “I’m sorry about today.”
She nods. “It’s good to know you have my back.”
I escape into my apartment.
• • •
In the morning, there is a message from Eddie on my computer. Maybe this will help you let it go. It’s the medical files from Dr. Ennis’ patients. The siphons without halos. Dr. Ennis wouldn’t release the files if he were guilty.
This doesn’t help me feel better, but I look at the files anyway because even with the goggles on I can’t give up. Nothing would show up on these files anyway; I need autopsy reports. I didn’t look at them yesterday.
The autopsies don’t reveal much. Each person had an fMRI scan done for the Mind Transfer Project in hopes that the redesign treatment would be approved. But thousands of other people have had scans done for the Mind Transfer Project and none of them have died.
I do a quick check of other siphons that have also had fMRI scans for the Mind Transfer Project; they all have halos.
In the victim who committed suicide, the autopsy report shows a brain bleed in the frontal cortex, along with temporal lobe damage. The absent halo case with the PTSD case shows lesions in the amygdala. My brain buzzes with some sort of connection.
If I take off the goggles, I could see it, but I promised Eddie that I won’t take them off.
Ava is waiting for me at the door. She must have been able to get me in with Dr. Reg. We take the trolley down to the Bellevue Research Center.