This Mortal Coil

by Emily Suvada

  “We’ll do a broadcast,” Novak says.

  The man groans. “That’s your answer to everything.”

  Novak tosses her head. “This will be different, though. We’ll put Catarina and Crick in it. We’ll come up with a story about us breaking him out of Cartaxus . . .”

  “Oh, I like it,” the woman says.

  The three of them start planning out some kind of giant broadcast, but I barely hear them. Jun Bei’s simulation is spinning through my mind. My father didn’t leave it to break us out of a bunker; it was another backup plan—something he knew that I would see and understand. Jun Bei’s simulation hacked into every panel in Homestake, using the same trapdoor mechanism the nightstick around my neck relies on. It’s the one crack in the security of every single panel.

  I think I can use it too.

  I look up sharply, meeting Novak’s gaze as the final jigsaw piece of my father’s plan slides neatly into place.

  “I can do this,” I say, interrupting their conversation. “I can get the vaccine into every panel, but you’re going to have to do exactly as I say.”

  CHAPTER 32

  “IT’S BEAUTIFUL,” NOVAK SAYS, LEANING over my shoulder as she reads the code I’ve written.

  “It’s evil,” I reply.

  She just smiles, turning her steely gaze to me. “We live in evil times, Catarina. Sometimes we need to embrace that to survive.”

  I sit back, crossing my arms, staring at the terminal’s screen. It took me less than an hour to write the code that will download the vaccine into every panel. Novak found me a server terminal with a screen and keyboard, and I sat and built a weapon out of Jun Bei’s trapdoor code. I wove elements from my own viruses with lines from the sparse precision of Cartaxus’s nightstick, blending them into something terrible.

  An abomination.

  While I was working, Cartaxus and Novak were scrambling to set up a joint satellite network—a formal alliance to share gentech code and information. That was one of my demands, and they met it. They’re preparing their people for a unified world.

  “So what happens now?” I ask. “Are you ready to run the decryption?”

  “Not quite yet.” Novak steps away. “I always said I was going to put you on one of my broadcasts. I’d like you to stand beside me while we announce the vaccine to the world.”

  My stomach clenches. I’ve forced myself to write this code, and I’m ready to give up my life for the vaccine, but I don’t know if I can pretend to be happy about it. “I-I don’t know what I’d say.”

  “I’ll handle that.” Novak’s eyes roam over my face. She lifts a strand of my tangled hair, frowning. “But first, we have to get you cleaned up.”

  Three hours later, I’m led into an igloolike dome with cameras covering its walls and ceiling like a thousand black, unblinking eyes. Novak’s daily broadcasts are recorded in VR for people to watch through their panels, so it looks like she’s standing in their homes, speaking directly to them. Most virtual reality segments are filmed by just two or three cameras, whose footage is fed through animation engines that build a 3-D image, but the result is never perfect. Sometimes it messes up. The only way to get a perfect image is to film each actor in a VR dome, but they’re expensive, and rare. The Skies, as it turns out, has a few of them.

  A dozen lights have been carefully positioned between the cameras to light up my hair and face. A makeup artist frantically dusts a final layer of powder across my cheeks before ducking out through a rubber hole in the side of the dome.

  I stand awkwardly, shoving my hands in my pockets. Novak’s team dressed me in slim-fitting black jeans, a white tank top, and knee-high boots. Three makeup artists worked on my face for an hour before throwing up their hands and declaring that they’d done their best with what they were given. My scarred skin has been smoothed out with a temporary nanofiller, and my hair has been washed, treated, and blow-dried into rippling waves. My long-neglected eyebrows are sharp, and my eyes are lined with black, my eyelashes miraculously multiplied. Catching my reflection in the lenses is like looking at an alien creature. I still look like me, but it’s a version of myself that I never imagined was possible. I look smart, refined. It’s the perfect mask to hide the nerves jumping inside me.

  “On in five,” a familiar voice says, crackling from the speakers embedded in the dome’s ceiling. A red light above me grows brighter, and a handful of tiny, palm-size screens tucked between the cameras flicker on. One to my left shows Dax tilting his head back and forth, looking at himself in his cameras. The screen to my right shows a stylist fixing Novak’s hair.

  We’re going to stand together—a Cartaxus scientist, the leader of the Skies, and Lachlan Agatta’s daughter—and recite a speech Novak’s team has written. It talks about how important it is for everyone to download the vaccine, and how safe it is, how thoroughly the code has been tested. I’ll tell the world how Dax and I communicated secretly for years, like star-crossed lovers. That the two of us convinced the Skies and Cartaxus to finally work together.

  It’s all lies.

  The speech makes no mention of the fact that Dax only joined Cartaxus because they took him away at gunpoint. It doesn’t explain that none of us except for Dax has even seen the vaccine, let alone tested it.

  That the only person who understood the code is gone.

  But that doesn’t matter. The broadcast is merely serving as a distraction from the true nature of what the satellites are sending. While we’re talking, my trapdoor code will be beamed into the feeds of every satellite in orbit and then crawl silently into the arm of every person on the planet. No one will have a choice. People won’t even know it’s happened. It’s hidden by the same firewall that concealed Cole’s black-out code from him. Later, when the unlocked vaccine is broadcast, this trapdoor code will automatically download it. The vaccine will run in secret until some hacker eventually discovers it, but by then the virus will be dead.

  Everyone will be safe, and humanity will survive, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that this is a violation on a fundamental level.

  “Stand on the mark, Agatta,” the voice in the speakers says.

  I shift until I’m standing on a piece of tape, then look around at the cameras. “Leoben, is that you? Where are you?”

  He chuckles. “Yeah, it’s me. I’m in Novak’s command center, helping them hook up to Cartaxus’s network. I’ll be running your code. I see you’ve borrowed some of Jun Bei’s handiwork.”

  I cross my arms uneasily. “I didn’t think we had much of a choice.”

  “No arguments from me. Anyone crazy enough not to download the vaccine probably shouldn’t be in control of their panel anyway.”

  I nod, chewing my lip. He’s right; I know he is. This is the only way to beat the virus. So why does it feel so wrong?

  A long beat passes. When Leoben speaks again, his voice is softer. “So, Dax told me about the decryption.”

  I freeze, glancing at Dax’s screen. He’s still turning his head back and forth, looking at himself. He can’t hear anything we’re saying. Hopefully, wherever he is, Cole can’t either.

  “What did he say?”

  “He told me everything, said I should know what’s going to happen in case Cole, well . . . in case Cole does what he’s trained to do.”

  “Oh.” I scratch my neck nervously, unsure of what to say.

  “I misjudged you,” Leoben says. “I thought you were just like Lachlan, but you’re not. I’m sorry. And don’t worry, I’ll handle Cole.”

  I swallow. “Cole and I, we’re not . . . I remembered what you said before. I’ve been trying not to let us get too close.”

  Leoben sighs. “Yeah, well, maybe you shouldn’t have listened to me.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Before he can reply, the red light above me flashes again, and the feed to the speakers cuts out with a hiss of static.

  The broadcast is starting.

  On their respective screens, Dax a
nd Novak are staring straight ahead, poised and still, waiting for us to go live. They’re ready, but I’m not. I still don’t know how I feel about this. I don’t know how I’m supposed to stand, or look, or smile. My reflection is that of a stranger, and my speech is a stranger’s lies.

  The speakers start playing a song I recognize as the Cartaxus anthem—a series of strong, bracing chords. It merges slowly into the trumpets that mark the start of every one of Novak’s broadcasts. The introduction finishes, and the dome is suddenly filled with white, blinding light. I try not to flinch or cover my eyes. For all I know, we’re live, and there are currently three billion people staring at my face.

  On her screen, Novak gives her trademark smile. “Good evening, everyone,” she says. “Thank you for watching, for coming together to share this very special broadcast with us. As you know from today’s announcements, we will soon be broadcasting the Hydra vaccine. To discuss it, we have two important people here today. On my left is Miss Catarina Agatta, daughter of the late Dr. Lachlan Agatta, and the Skies hacker known as Bobcat.”

  I force myself to smile and give a stilted wave. The dome’s lenses seem to pulse, as though transmitting the world’s attention to me instead of the other way around.

  Novak turns to her right. “And this is Dr. Dax Crick, the man himself. Our hero, ladies and gentlemen. The author of the Hydra vaccine.”

  My smile freezes. I stare at Dax’s screen. He should be correcting Novak. He should be explaining that my father is the author, and that he was only his assistant. He should say that he doesn’t even know how the vaccine works, but instead, Dax just shoots Novak a smile.

  “It was a group effort,” he says. “Dr. Agatta’s work was crucial in coding the vaccine, as were the efforts of the rest of my team.”

  His team? My stomach twists. What the hell is this? How can he be lying so smoothly about something so important?

  “You’re being too modest,” Novak says. “I read the reports of the recent glitch at the Homestake bunker where the airlocks jammed during a routine lockdown. You logged in and closed those airlocks, putting your life on the line to save those people, and you’ve dedicated the last two years to writing a vaccine that will save us all. I think it’s only right to recognize you as the hero that you are.”

  My heart slams against my ribs. No. That wasn’t Dax. I used his login and password at Homestake, but it was me who closed the airlocks. Dax is the one who suggested the kick simulation in the first place.

  Now he’s taking credit for everything. For my father’s work. For mine.

  And there’s absolutely nothing I can do about it.

  Discrediting Dax live on air means discrediting the vaccine. I can’t say anything that could raise doubts with the survivors watching this broadcast. But if I just stand here like this and let Dax and Novak lie, then everyone is going to read my silence as a confirmation.

  It shouldn’t really matter. I don’t need credit, and I know my father wouldn’t care whose name was on the vaccine as long as it reached the people who needed it. But that doesn’t make it any easier to stand here and listen to lies coming from the mouth of the man who’s going to jack a cord into me in a few hours and kill me.

  I’m about to let these people take my life away, and they’re lying about me with smiles on their faces.

  My head spins. Dax and Novak keep talking about the vaccine, about Cartaxus and their labs, about the new joint network. All I can do is stand and stare, until Novak says my name, and everything goes silent.

  “Catarina?” Novak’s brow creases. “Isn’t that right?”

  I just stare at her. I don’t even know what she just asked me. I couldn’t hear a thing through the shock and betrayal drowning my thoughts. I want to tell the world the truth—that Dax didn’t save the people at Homestake, that he didn’t write the vaccine, that he doesn’t even know what’s in it. None of us do, and we’re about to shove it into everyone’s arm without so much as letting them read it.

  This isn’t how it’s supposed to be. My father had a plan for us, and this can’t possibly be the way he wanted it to end. This plan has crashed and burned into a tangle of lies, but there’s no turning back now, and my hands are far from clean.

  The teleprompter’s screen grows brighter, flashing the speech I agreed to give. The deceit that I’ll be remembered for.

  I take a deep breath, stare into the wall of black lenses, and say what I’ve been told to.

  I won’t have to live with it much longer.

  CHAPTER 33

  AS SOON AS THE LIGHTS in my dome dim, I push through the rubber door, bumping into a camera-wielding bot, sending it skittering across the concrete. Dax’s dome is next to mine. His pale hand slides through his door, but I push him back in, shoving my way through, slamming him against the wall.

  His eyes fly wide. He stumbles, his head knocking against a lens in the cramped, curved space. The polished black glass shatters instantly. A streak of blood blossoms on his brow. He touches it, then stares at me in shock. “Princess, what the hell?”

  “What the hell?” I repeat, practically snarling. “What the hell was that, Dax? You lied about everything.”

  “Whoa, whoa,” he says, grabbing my wrists, pulling my hands off his shirt. “I had to. Novak and Cartaxus agreed that the vaccine needed a face.”

  “My father was the face,” I say, yanking my hands away. “It’s his code, his legacy. You can’t take credit for something you don’t even understand.”

  “Your father was tainted.” Dax wipes the blood from his forehead, scowling. “He screwed up Influenza and then turned into a recluse. The vaccine needed a fresh face, somebody more appealing than him.”

  “More appealing? Like the guy who saved the poor people at Homestake? You’re the one who almost killed them, Dax. How could you lie like that?”

  “Because I had to.” His voice grows sharp. “You think I like taking credit for Lachlan’s work? I’m going to spend the rest of my life being celebrated for something I didn’t do. I lied about it because it’s what the people needed, because Cartaxus and Novak asked me to. I lied so that you didn’t have to.”

  “But you made me complicit. I had no choice but to stand there and agree with you. You made me erase my father’s legacy in front of the whole world.”

  “What does his legacy matter to you?” Dax looks genuinely bewildered. “How can you care about him when his code is going to kill you in a few hours?”

  The words are like a knife. I stare at him, not breathing, unable to turn the pain inside me into words. Deep down, I know I’m angry with my father and I’m swinging that onto Dax. I know I’m terrified about the procedure, and I’m lashing out at him.

  But that’s not all—he’s right. I’m going to die tonight, and I cannot see a single hint of pain on Dax’s face.

  “You don’t care,” I breathe, stepping away. “You never cared, did you? It was all a lie. You just flirted with me because I was his daughter. Anything to get closer to him.”

  “That’s not true—”

  “Of course it is. That’s why you never contacted me, isn’t it? Two years surviving alone, and I heard nothing from you. You could have found a way to call, to tell me the truth.”

  “Your father wouldn’t let me, Princess.”

  “Don’t call me that! Don’t you dare call me that after what you just did.”

  “What I did?” Dax asks, his eyes flashing. “I’m not the one who left you behind, and I’m not the one who designed an encryption that used your life as the key. I didn’t experiment on children while my own daughter was growing up alone in boarding school. Your problem isn’t with me, Catarina, your problem is with your father. Don’t take it out on me because you hate your own goddamn DNA.”

  My breath catches. I step back and stumble into the wall of cameras. The dome is suddenly coffinlike and stifling. I have to get away from him. I turn and force my way through the rubber door, leaving Dax behind me, ignoring him when he c
alls after me.

  I’m not going back. I don’t care where I’m going, as long as it’s away from him. I run past the line of VR domes, dodging a group of workers. Tears blur my vision. I veer around a corner and stumble right into a wall.

  Only it’s not a wall, though he feels a lot like one.

  “Hey, Agatta?” Leoben asks, steadying me. “I was looking for Dax. Are you okay?”

  The mention of Dax’s name makes me want to lash out at Leoben, too, but instead I meet his worried eyes and find myself crumbling.

  “Cole,” I whisper, my voice breaking. “Please, Leoben, I need to find Cole.”

  Leoben looks me up and down, then nods and takes my arm, leading me through a corridor and outside. We cross a park, and he swipes me into a hotel with a broken neon sign and dim hallways that stink of genehacked weed.

  “He’s in room forty-eight, upstairs,” he says, pointing to a stairwell. “I’ll send someone over to get you when we’re ready for the decryption.”

  “Th-thank you,” I say. He leaves without another word, and I run up the stairs. When I reach Cole’s door, I grab the handle and push it open without knocking. I don’t want Cole to see me like this—fighting back tears, breathing so hard I can barely stand—but I need him so much right now I can’t stop myself.

  The door swings open into a tiny room with a boarded-over window. Cole, still dressed in his silver-dusted clothes, is sitting on the edge of a steel-framed bed. His head is lowered, his sketchbook held open in his hands, but he drops it and stands the moment he sees me. My heart is pounding from running up the stairs, but the sight of the sketchbook makes it skip a beat.

  “What’s wrong?” Cole is beside me in two fluid strides. “Cat, you’re shaking. What happened? Did someone hurt you?”

  I glance down at the sketchbook and back to him, my resolve wavering. He was looking at his drawings of her. Of Jun Bei. He’s still not over her, and I’m still not over Dax, judging by the way his words have shaken me.