by Sean Kennedy
Jacobs visual link to the t-droid severed after the two droids ran down the old boat launch onto the dried lakebed. His iGlass lenses cleared, slamming him back into the ship. The shock of it made him dizzy and he slumped over on the canvas pillow.
“Boom! Howzat ground rush bro?!” Teeva laughed along with Butai, Kage and Joni, even Majka smiled from her observing stance as Teeva helped Jacob back into a sitting position.
“Incredible!” Jacob felt more confident in his balance again.
“Yeah it's a hard snap when you're not expecting it.” Kage said “I did that so you know what the worst of it feels like. It's harder as a passenger. When you pilot you'll be able to handle it better.” Kage said as his muscles still twitched from piloting the droid.
“Oh, I dunno if I can pilot one of these.”
“Yeah you can, the first time Kage took me for a ride I puked my guts out; you just got a little stunned by ground rush.” Butai said, “For your first time, you did pretty good.”
“Yeah?” Jacob saw the hint of a smile on Butai’s face as Teeva slapped him on the back “Bro! You were born for this!”
Kage pulled off his headset and walked over throwing back a fabric tapestry revealing two sealed doors. Kage spun the wheel handles before swinging the hatches open.
Through one door Jacob recognized the dark shape of Butai’s t-droid by a ladder reaching to the upper deck. Kage pulled the second door open, and his t-droid stood as a lifeless shell while Kage detached it’s backpack.
“Your first treasure!” Kage announced pulling the plastic wrapped box from the pack and presenting it to Jacob in the sitting circle.
“You think it still works?” Jacob asked, taking the the box to examine the calligraphy logo with Kaizen written beneath it.
In the clear light, Jacob could see a humanoid head pictured on the box, almost featureless exept for two crossing lines and a small circle like an target reticle where the left eye would be.
“The Kaizen got a real following,” Joni said, “your uncle should think it's pretty cool.”
Jacob nodded and thought again about the mismatched house.
“Maybe I should go back there.”
“Well, if they’re kin, I mean, ya’ could like ...give ‘em a chance bro! It’s hard out here with nothing. I mean, I got your back bro, but we’re all hustlin’ just to stay alive!”
“Yeah but if we fix up another droid like the one you brought back, I'm damn sure he could drive it.” Kage said winking at Jacob.
Majka was beside Jacob with a small ceramic bowl of steaming spiced noodles and Jacob's stomach lurched with hunger.
“Thanks!” Jacob passed the Kaizen box to Joni.
“Don’t worry, I won't open it.” She said turning it over in her hands.
He took the warm bowl of noodles, but stared down at the two straight sticks sticking out of the bowl to one side. Jacob picking up one stick to see if it was hollow, like some kind of straw, but it wasn’t. He took one of the sticks in each hand and looked up to see everyone staring at him as Majka rushed back to his side.
“Here you go.” She handed Jacob a plastic food spork, taking back the the two strange sticks.
“It’s cool bro, there’s gonna be lots of new stuff.” Teeva rose to help hand out bowls to the others.
“But first Jacob needs more training.“ Majka said, and Jacob felt a little nervous when he saw her firm expression.
“Direct your eyes to the big screen, oh seeker.”
The media screen reset and with the hollow crash of a gong the movie began anew. An ornate house like a floating temple appeared on the screen, standing beside a placid lake, amidst sculpted Japanese landscaping.
Jacob knew it was Japanese, because the bold words “Tokyo, Japan” appeared before the gong could fade.
“Meet Sho Kasugi bro!” Teeva whispered as he dropped himself back on the cushion beside him and stretched out on the large pillow.
On the screen, The main ninja realized other ninjas had just killed his family, but Jacob fell asleep before Sho caught an arrow with his teeth.
Chapter 6
“C’mon bro, we gotta go.”
Jacob woke as Teeva shook him. The painful throbbing in his head told him that not nearly enough time had passed since he fell asleep.
“Why? What’s wrong?”
“Alcazar bro!”
“Huh?” An attic bunk flashed in his mind as Jacob tried to clear the fog. Only Majka and Teeva remained in the pillow circle, the room lit only by the dull light of the large blank media screen.
“Orientation bro! An’ I gotta get us some rainwater mints. C’mon bro!”
Jacob struggled to stand from the cushion. He was leaning back in a stretch when a gentle hand touched his shoulder. He turned to see Majka’s pale eyes as she handed him a small thermos.
“Soup. Please bring back the container.”
“Thank you. I’ll bring it back as soon as I can.”
“Make sure that’s soon.” Majka turned her eyes to Teeva, who shrugged.
“Hey, it’s no sweat! He’s gotta go there anyways, and we can get the mineral mints for a third of town’s rip-off prices.
“Just be careful Jacob, listen to what Teeva tells you. And don’t be in too much of a hurry to return; you should go see your uncle, he will be worried.”
Jacob Nodded. “I will.” The notion of the farmhouse didn’t seem as scary as it was last night.
“C’mon bro, you really don’t wanna be late!” Teeva called and Jacob hurried to catch up.
Going through the hatches helped get his blood moving, and by the the time they stepped into the early morning purple, Jacob’s senses were alive.
He realized Mac was right, it did look better in the morning. The planet spun itself into a new day, bringing deeps reds and bright yellows in the far sky against the fading night’s blue echoes.
“Is it always like this?’ Jacob asked.
“Is what always like what?” Teeva kicked a thick coiled rope off the deck next to the ladder.
“The sky! It looks incredible!” Jacob turned craning his neck.
“The sunrise is always incredible, even if it's raining. That's what my Dad used to say.” Teeva’s voice vanished over the gunwale as he slid down the rope.
Jacob followed Teeva, but slower and more awkward, down the thick rope to the dry lakebed below. By the time he made it to the ground, Teeva was walking out his now empty bike.
“We’ll get you some wheels bro, but right now we gotta double.”
“Double?” Jacob asked.
Teeva looked confused for a moment before smiling. “‘Course, you prolly never rode a bike before huh bro?” Teeva threw his leg over the bike’s banana seat.
“Okay bro, get on just behind me, then just lean back a little, I’ll do the pedaling.”
Jacob obeyed, and after a few corrections on how to hang on, he was ready.
“Okay!” Teeva said and pushed off.
Jacob felt an empty falling feeling in his lower back as Teeva stood up, pumping the pedals. The bike started moving as the first rays of the sun slipped over the horizon spraying gold across the lakebed.
At the boat launch, they slipped off the bike to push it up the concrete slope, then once the ground leveled out, they remounted the bike and returned to the crunching sound of rubber on hard packed dirt.
The rhythmic pedals mixed well with the slighter petroleum scent of the night-cooled seaside sludge. They pulled out past the great blue tank, turning onto the asphalt as it emerged.
They picked up speed on the paved road; the jerking motions from Teeva’s pedal pumping shook Jacob as they rushed through the cool morning air.
As they rode along the pavement, the quarantine zone’s landscape began to change. The packaging refuse and wind blown litter of the zone fell away to reveal boats and ships, cannibalized and built into makeshift housing by the zone’s residents. Smaller longboats had been flipped upside down and fashioned into r
oofs over yurt style walls, while larger craft were buried in the earth to be stabilized.
Shifting figures began to appear, riding bikes and wheeled surf decks along the road, each keeping their distance from others as they moved in a quarantine rush hour.
A wide sign revealed itself at the side of the roadway.
It read ‘Alcazar Reorientation Facility Ahead’, but someone had painted two black lines across the name Alcazar, changing it to read “Zero Day Revolution Ahead” in freehand black paintbrush letters. Jacob thought it might be some kind of joke, maybe Teeva would explain once they got to the facility.
Alcazar was an old high school, with prefabricated dome structures surrounded by a high fence. A second, newer sign emerged saying it was now only five hundred meters to the facility.
The fence stretched in a great arc around the buildings, and once they moved a little closer, Jacob saw there was a second fence, not quite as tall, a few meters back from the first. The crowd funneled into a chain of bodies, walking with bikes and boards as they made their way through a large double gated entrance.
“Where have you brought me?” Jacob whispered over Teeva's shoulder.
“Sorry bro, you’re gonna hate this place, but you gotta go if you ever want out of the zone legit.”
“Why?” Jacob asked as they merged into the line.
Teeva spoke, keeping his voice low, “just follow my lead bro.” Teeva looked around at the student line that stretched back some distance behind them.
“Do you go here?”
“Naw, I’m just your escort bro.”
“I need an escort?”
“Yeah all new fish can be escorted into the facility by a family member or guardian, and since I’m your bro...” he winked at Jacob, “once we’re in, I’m gonna hit facility stores for mineral mints.”
Jacob looked at the gray steel of the double fences. "I don't think I want to go here.”
Teeva laughed “Don’t blame you bro, but it's the only way out.”
“Why don’t you come here?”
“Got kicked out bro! My genes got me locked down in the zone forever. If Joni or me, or any of us got busted in the city? Bro! They’d treat us like bioterrorists, shoot us on sight and send in droids in clean suits to scrape us up.”
“But I’m not sick.” Jacob shook his head.
“Yeah bro, but THEY don’t know that.” Teeva pointed to the Deep City’s faint spires in the distance.
“It’s like I said, big money believes the record. They see you're from the quarantine, so you're infected. Chop-chop goes the axe bro. The only way out is to get the zone record cleared through the facility.” Teeva shrugged, “Or I guess get far enough away that no one has access to the records, but I can’t imagine where that would be.”
“What about Kage, Majka and the others?” Jacob asked.
“Majka’s an albino and Kage is progerian. All of Dragon Cobra are classed as genetically defective bro, hardly even human in Deep City. All we’d get from Alcazar would be regular injections of whatever they’d want to test on us.”
“What about the parents?” Jacob asked before he could stop himself.
“How do you mean?”‘
“Well, if the kids have to be certified by this place how do the parents get out of here?”
Teeva closed his eyes and dropped his head “Oh bro, it's hard enough to get clean kids out of the zone. I don’t think I've ever heard of someone leaving who wasn’t a kid. The zone is a death sentence bro, everyone’s just waiting for it to be carried out.”
The line moved forward, and Jacob saw a huge analog clock that had been built in above the gates with stark bold letters cut against the sky. “Knowledge” was written to one side and “Power” on the other, outlined in steel.
“Can they hurt you here?” Jacob asked.
“Oh bro, if you screw around at all in here they will light you up...” Teeva started and then caught himself as Jacob’s eyes went wide. He saw two large security t-droids putting bands around young people wrists before they could proceed through the second gate.
“Listen bro, when we get to the gate they're gonna give you a thing like a wristband. You gotta put it on, and don’t try to take it off before you leave. Only the droids can take it off.”
“What is it?” Jacob asked, disliking this place more with each step they took forward in line.
“It tracks everywhere you are and tells you where you need to go next.”
Jacob looked at the ground, and found himself thinking of Mac again. Maybe he would go back to the house after this was done. Teeva needed these rain mints to get clean water, so at least he could do something to thank his new friend. Also, there had to be something the Dojo could use in those cargo piles around his uncle's house.
The two security droids were standing like statues as he approached, scanning as the crowd pushed their bikes and boards through narrow gates. The security t-droids were larger than the unit Jacob had ridden with Kage, with two lenses in normal eye positions and a third eye in the middle of their forehead that flickered as it scanned the crowd.
A large bin with a green hole accepted each person’s wrist as they passed. Yellow electronic wristbands appeared with a quick snap as they withdrew their arms and proceeded through the gate.
Jacob felt a sudden wash of fear, and thoughts of tetrazine filled his mind.
“But I’ve never even been here before.”
“Yeah bro, but that netscreen they gave you said they were expecting you right? They would have already sent your records to the center. Once you put the cuff on, it will link up and and you just follow the arrow on your wrist.”
“You're not coming with me?” Jacob tried not to panic.
“I told you bro, I’m your escort to get you in the gates, then I gotta book. It's too easy bro, just stay quiet and at the end of the day follow the arrow to the gate. Stick your arm in that bin, and you're free and clear.”
Jacob's mind was bleeding questions, and the lurking fear pacing along the facility fence line could smell it.
They stepped through the first gate and Teeva pointed to the glowing hole Jacob was supposed to put his hand in. Jacob rolled back his white blazer sleeve and pushed his hand in.
SNAP!
The noise made him jump and when he pulled his hand back a bright yellow band with a micro display was wrapped around his wrist.
Teeva stuck close behind Jacob as the rotating gate locked up and wouldn’t move. One of the sentinel telepresence doids shifted its three eyes down at the two of them.
“He’s a new student. I’m just taking my bro to orientation and them I‘m out.” Teeva offered to the droid like he was an old friend.
A few short moments passed, and Jacob watched the circle spinning on the wristband’s micro display, like a coin on a table top. When it stopped, his name came up on the tiny screen and the gate turned allowing them access.
Jacob reached for the Immersion iGlasses in his blazer pocket, but Teeva caught his hand.
“Not here bro, it’s a reason to get burned.”
“Burned?” Jacob asked.
“...and don't take your pills out either, same same.”
The two stepped away from the entrance gate. The word Orientation appeared on his wristband display, with 330 Feet and blinking arrow to show the direction.
“Orientation,” Jacob read off his wrist, and Teeva made a sucking noise through his teeth.
“Yeah, it's best to get that over with.” He made a wincing smile.
“K, bro, there’s no easy way to tell you this, but these bracelets can hurt you.”
“What?’ Jacob spoke louder than he intended.
“Some instructors are cool about it, others are not cool about it and they’ll hit you for any reason.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Jacob felt a rising pressure behind his eyes.
“I did bro! Last night!” Teeva held out the burn on his wrist he showed Jacob the night before.
&
nbsp; “You got to do it bro, there’s no other way. Besides bro, this gets us some mineral mints on the sly!”
“But...this thing is gonna burn me?” Jacob stared in horror at the yellow bracelet.
“Not with heat, It’s just a pain generator. It generates a nerve signal that tells your brain that you're in pain and your brain believes you. It doesn't really hurt you, but it feels like it so still sucks pretty good. I only got my scar because it short-circuited when I tried to cut it off this one time.”
Jacob felt the ivory pills in his pocket, and remembered what Teeva had said about keeping them hidden.
“How bad is it?” Jacob asked as they climbed the gray steps leading to the plastic covered metal doors. Teeva reached the top and pulled the door open for Jacob to walk through.
“Depends on what the instructors set the intensity to and how sensitive you are, but it always sucks bro. Just stay quiet and gray bro and try not to think about it. You won’t have a problem bro,” Teeva snorted, “you’re not the type.”
Jacob let his eyes adjust to the dim indoor lighting out of the coastal sun. Other facility students streamed past them, hurrying silently in the hallways. The old school had its lockers and wall boards removed, but Jacob saw the white porcelain of drinking fountains along the barren hallways.
The wristband’s micro display read Jacob had ten minutes to get 70 feet.
“What now?" Jacob asked.
“I only got 60 min to hit the stores and get out bro, then the droids will start looking for me.” Teeva slapped Jacob on the back.
“Remember bro just keep your head down, mouth shut, and follow your wrist.” he winked before taking off at a light jog down the hall.
“Don’t worry bro, you’ll be fine!” Teeva waved before vanishing into the hallway’s rushing crowd.
Chapter 7
The old brickwork school felt as though the very building hated what it had become. Everywhere he looked, other young people scurried between classrooms like insects escaping the light.
Following the arrow’s instruction, he paused, then turned into an old classroom. The room reminded Jacob of a big semicircle stairway that reached away from a podium that rested beneath a large red digital clock. Others had already taken their seats. Some of the crowd looked older, some younger but each was within a few years of the others.