by Jacob Whaler
After the storm passes, the floor of Luca’s cell is a puddle that soaks her futon and moves under the steel door and into the hallway. The wind dies down, and the storm moves further inland, toward Tokyo.
Inside the Institution and outside the walls, the water awakens smells that only come alive in the humidity. The stench of dried feces and vomit mix with the aroma of fresh mud and cedar bark. Luca picks out the smells she likes and ignores the others. As the clouds part, brightness floods the night sky.
The buzz of cicadas returns.
Luca’s eyes float open and stare up through the holes at the full moon. She has tried to speak to it before, but it never answers. Two beams of light pierce the darkness and come to rest on the wall, misshapen rectangles floating in the dark.
Her eyes open wider. Her pulse quickens. Light is rare in her cell, and she must move quickly.
Without looking down, her fingers slide along the floor to a familiar place where they find the treasure under the futon, a small plastic box stolen from the trash weeks ago and hidden from the eyes of the white uniforms. She has carefully filled it with bits of dirt and sand pinched from the corners of her cell and scraped from under the door.
Her gaze goes to the box.
A slender white stem with a hint of green rises just above the rim, born from a precious seed that blew in through the window. Two delicate leaves, no bigger than the black beetles that swarm the walls, are frozen in time, half unfolded from a tiny pocket of green on the end of the stem.
Silently, she slides across the floor and raises the box in both hands until it is bathed in the beams of moonlight pouring down. Her upraised palms take on a silver glow.
The tiny plant awakens.
In her mind, she hears a quiet stirring as the leaves absorb the light. She senses a high-pitched note, fainter than a whisper, octaves above any sound she’s ever heard with her ears. As she listens, the single note cascades down, breaking into fragments that trigger images of flowing colors. A tiny symphony of light plays in her mind, mixing with the melody of the cicadas.
Caught up in the rapture of oneness, Luca adds words to the harmony.
“Drink in the light, little one. Someday, you’ll grow tall and strong. Like the trees outside the wall.”
The sounds in her head pause for an instant and then explode into a chorus that brings a smile to Luca’s face.
The light flashes red on the wall. This time, it doesn’t stop.
Her body stiffens.
Footsteps race down the hall on the other side of the metal door.
A single teardrop draws a line down her cheek as she closes her eyes and stills her breathing. Her hands come down and carefully hide the plant under the corner of the futon.
The door bursts open behind her.
3
MOLECULE
The structure doesn’t make sense.
It’s never made sense.
Qaara shakes her head, staring at the holographic model of a complex molecule floating at eye level. The neon colors of each atom burn in the darkness like a 3-D constellation. The general helix shape of its core is familiar enough, but something isn’t right. On a whim, she reaches out a finger to the holo and moves one of the atoms to a new location. When she lets go, the words Unstable Configuration appear above, and the molecule slides back to its original position.
Always the same result.
Frank Mercer, the CEO of Genesis Corporation, whom she met only once, hired her six months ago to find the weakness in the molecule, to figure out how to break it apart, stop it, destroy it, kill it.
But the molecule cannot be tweaked, altered or reshaped. She has no idea what it does, but after months of futile experiments, one thing appears certain. The molecule’s configuration is indestructible.
Just like the wildly successful career and life she was born to, carefully designed and nurtured by her father and then forced upon her.
As the holo slowly rotates, she rubs her eyes, wincing at the sting, and wonders whether the sun has risen.
Time to rest.
The tip of her finger drops down and touches the slate in her hand. There’s a hum above her as an aperture in the ceiling opens, allowing soft light to pour down and illuminate her office. A single sheet of clear, programmable glass forms the outside window and curves across her line of vision like a massive lens, floor to ceiling. As its milky surface turns clear, it disappears from view, leaving the illusion of nothing between her and 250 floors of open space below.
Eyelids dropping down, Qaara pulls in a deep inhale and waits for the oxygen to flood her brain. With the rush of clarity, her eyes float open, and she stares out over the Manhattan skyline, the jewel of the East Coast, the capital of the New United States, at least the ever-shrinking parts of it hugging the Atlantic coast that haven’t been abandoned yet to the encroaching chaos. As always, her gaze is drawn to the seawall that stretches around Manhattan like a massive cellular membrane, holding the City and its inhabitants together, protecting them from what lies on the other side. Two meters thick and a hundred meters high, it’s made of billions of layers of microscopic graphene.
And it’s completely transparent. Like air.
People come from all over the civilized world to see and study it, to run their fingers across its delicate surface and marvel at the beauty of the humpbacks that, thanks to massively rising sea levels, gather on the other side for their daily feedings.
The Wall, as it’s called, is the most popular tourist attraction in the City, replacing the aquariums and zoos of yesteryear that are now outlawed. The streets next to the Wall are lined with luxury condos and businesses catering to the rich.
When Qaara looks at the Wall, all she thinks of are the countless hours she spent on the team that first developed graphene for industrial applications. She was an undergraduate at MIT when she made her discovery one night in the lab after everyone else had gone home.
She was barely twenty years old.
The team had engaged in months of research, without success. That night in the lab, the fog suddenly lifted in her brain, and the ideal molecular structure for the new material became clear in a flash of inspiration.
It was a major coup for someone so young.
The industrial machine took over. An exhaustive advertising campaign of endless promotion followed.
Now the entire planet knows about it. The new substance is made entirely of carbon pulled from the atmosphere and crystalized into a patented grid structure by nano-bots. It’s biodegradable and a hundred times stronger than steel.
They call it Graff.
The name wasn’t all that original but everything else about it was. Hailed around the world as the new miracle building material that would save humankind, the result was a dream come true for Qaara’s father. The daughter he programmed for success fulfilled her destiny. And his chemical company in Mumbai that funded the research was certain to get rich on the patent royalties.
Within days, Qaara’s father licensed the patent to Genesis Corporation, the company she works for now.
Years later, demand is still high for Graff. Every coastal city on the planet wants, and needs, their own Wall. And that’s just the beginning. With production in full swing, Graff is replacing steel and plastic in air and sea transports, automobiles, medical devices, heavy weapons. With each day, the list of potential uses expands.
And now, thanks to all the stories floating around on the Mesh, everyone knows about the gorgeous prodigy from India who found the path to rescue the world from itself.
People still stop her on the street and ask for a quick video shot. They drive her crazy, always pushing, touching, telling her how beautiful and smart she is. Would she like to join them for dinner? How about an interview? How about a weekend in Rio?
It’s been the same story her entire life. Thanks to the marvels of her heritage and the wonders of genetic engineering, as her father has patiently explained to her on countless occasions, she’s been bles
sed with an overabundance of the two things humans value most, after wealth: beauty and brains.
One or the other would have been more than enough. With both, she is more than human, treated as an object rather than an individual. Used as a tool to accomplish other people’s ends. Never given the space to pursue her own interests.
Grooming her from the time she was a child, her parents sent her out of the country and away from family to the only schools worthy of her intellect, schools that would guarantee her future success. She grew up mostly alone, craving human affection.
Even now, friends value her most for the status she gives them. Companionship is not part of the equation. She has countless daily interactions that leave her cold and lonely.
And then there are men.
She knows the look. Driven by animal instinct, men have pursued her relentlessly since her youth. But her father is a picky man, and arrangements for marriage have not yet been forced upon her. He’s still looking for a man worthy of the hand of his daughter.
As he is apt to say, one should never sell a stock while it is still rising in value.
And now, years after the invention of Graff, Qaara finds herself under the thumb of another man.
Frank Mercer. The elusive President and CEO of Genesis Corporation.
So far, he’s shown more interest in her brains than anything else. It’s given her an opportunity to escape the constant gaze of others and find temporary relief in the semi-seclusion of her office. And that’s the way she likes it. For now, she can stay inside and bury herself in her work.
Unfortunately, it’s not a long-term solution.
Her gaze wanders to the brown smudge on the far horizon, beyond the thin edge of civilization that clings to the coast, in the direction of the lawless interior of the continent, long abandoned by the old United States of America.
A place known simply as the Zone.
No longer united, the amber waves of grain and lush fields of corn have given way to deserts, desolation and death.
The Zone is home to bandits, outlaws, scavengers.
On every continent, it’s essentially the same story. Civilization ends within a few dozen miles of the ocean.
Yet, in spite of the scary stories, in spite of the universal revulsion in the City for the Zone, it carries a certain appeal for Qaara. She’s dreamed of it more than once. A place where she could leave all her prisons behind and become a new person.
To finally be an individual and not an object.
Someday, she tells herself, she will find the courage to get away, maybe even go off-grid for a while. Find herself.
Qaara shakes her head to clear the images. Daydreaming has become too much of a habit lately.
Time for a quick diversion to clear her mind.
Slipping out of her lab coat, Qaara walks along the window to the far end of the office in a black leather bodysuit, the only outer symbol of her inner desire for rebellion. Never mind that it’s the current fashion for young professional women in the City, almost a requirement. It had taken courage to make the purchase, to allow herself the luxury of dressing in fashion. To feel a connection.
If her father knew, he would scold her. He would tell her to live above others. To be better than they are.
Her palm presses a white square, and the ceiling pulls away to reveal a three-story climbing wall. Organic finger holds push through the soft surface of the wall. A harness drops down on the end of a blue cord, and she steps into it, legs first, and pulls it around her waist, securing the clasp with a click.
She had it installed a month ago. Now she climbs at least twice a day for exercise and to release stress.
Concentrating on the image of a spider as her inspiration, Qaara makes it to the top and pushes away, dangling on the blue cord and dropping slowly to the floor.
Too easy.
“Difficulty grade five,” she says.
Two-thirds of the holds on the wall melt away.
That’s more like it.
This time, it takes three minutes to reach the top. When she does, she pushes off and drops back to the floor, out of breath and refreshed.
Wiping away the sweat beads on her forehead, she walks back to the center of the office, threads her arms through the lab coat and grabs a slate off the desk.
“Another all-nighter, Ms. Kapoor?”
The male voice through the open door startles her, but she’s had a lot of practice hiding her emotions and does a good job of masking any surprise. Lab coat hanging askew, the bodysuit beneath is in full view. Horrified by this breach of protocol, she twists and pulls in an attempt to cover up. The slate slips from her fingers and clatters to the floor.
She bends to retrieve it, taps its surface and the holo of the molecule disappears.
She turns, and her gaze falls on a man leaning against the doorway, mid-twenties, arms folded, blue overalls slightly open at the chest and stretched thin over a muscular frame. Dark hair down to his shoulders. It’s the kind of body one might expect on a WFL footballer whose parents could afford the price of pre-embryonic genetic tweaking, but it looks strangely out of place on a man from the cleaning staff.
A mere sweeper from the Fringe.
“I’m sorry. Did someone send for you?” Qaara avoids eye contact and slips the slate into a large pocket. Her hand instinctively clings to an organic cylinder made of silver and glass that slides comfortably into her palm. “I don’t recall needing any—”
The jax drops from her hand, bounces twice on the floor and rolls away toward the stranger.
Qaara lurches to grab it, teeters off balance and falls, knees hitting the floor. Wincing from the pain, she goes down onto her belly, arms outstretched, chin level with the man’s shoes.
“Got it.” The man beats her to the jax and scoops it up. As soon as his fingers touch it, its blue light fades and dies. For an agonizing second, their eyes lock.
“Here’s your jax, Ms. Kapoor.” The man offers it to her on his open palm and reaches his other hand down to help her up. “Looks like it winked off.”
Ignoring the hand, Qaara stands to her feet. “Skin recog technology.” She grabs the jax, wishing she hadn’t said the word skin. “Thanks.”
“I’m here for the stain on the floor.” The man nods, moving deeper into the office and bending down, eyes searching.
“Stain?”
“There it is.” He pulls a blue cloth out of a pouch resting on his hip and begins to rub the floor in slow circular motions. “That's why I came up. You spilled your coffee. Can’t have our star scientist working in filthy conditions. Everything’s got to be pristine. Boss’s orders.” He scrubs for a few more seconds and brings his face closer to the floor, inspecting his work.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t drink coffee.”
“Someone does.” The man doesn’t look up.
Qaara can’t help noticing the bulging biceps. “Thanks.” With effort, she looks away. “I have to slip out for a meeting. Take your time.”
“I’ll have it all cleaned up for you when you get back.”
As Qaara walks by, she sees the man’s gaze following her dark hair as it cascades down the back of her lab coat. She turns to get another look at the biceps and then silently curses herself.
“Name’s Jedd,” he says. “Jedd Dexter, the Third, with two d’s on Jedd.”
His words come slowly, like he’s really thinking about them. And the name. So quaint. Definitely not from the City. Totally Fringe material.
“I’m Qaara. It’s nice to meet you. Thank you for being so thorough.” Qaara’s head involuntarily dips in a subtle nod. She curses herself again.
The man’s aroma of cheap soap mixed with a hint of sweat is pleasant and unsettling.
“No need to introduce yourself to me.” Jedd smiles to reveal a mouthful of teeth. “Everyone from here to Tokyo knows Qaara Kapoor.”
She can’t take her eyes off the teeth. Filed down from use, definitely out of alignment. A few shades darker than
neon white. All originals.
Again, how quaint.
For a moment, Qaara peers into Jedd’s eyes. One blue, one brown. A genetic defect. So different from her world of perfection. She knows she’s staring for too long, but can’t rip her gaze away. What’s his life like in the Fringe? Less structure and security, yes. But he can be and do whatever he chooses. She can see it in his face. He could quit his job, walk away, and no one could stop him. No one would even try.
What would it be like to have such freedom?
Jedd’s smile disappears. His hand covers his mouth. “That’s right. I’m one of them. One hundred percent organic, you might say. All original equipment. No genmods in my body. Crooked teeth, multicolored eyes. Not many like me in the City.”
Qaara blushes. “No, really, it’s not that. I just—”
“No need to explain.” Jedd takes a step back. “I’ve seen that look too many times, and I know exactly what it means. But don’t worry. It’s not your fault. The City is for perfect people.” His eyes sweep over her. “And you fit right in.”
Seconds of awkward silence float between them.
“I’m sorry.” Jedd shakes his head and clenches his jaw, flexing the muscles in his temple. “What I meant to say is you’re completely out of my league, and I’m crazy to even ask, but you’re incredibly beautiful, and it would be great if we could share lunch or maybe dinner. If you have time. Just to chat.” He turns and leans a palm against the wall near the door.
A voice in her mind screams yes.
But how can she? If her father ever found out—
Squeezing her jax so tightly that she’s afraid it might shatter, Qaara smiles weakly and turns away. “Sorry to be in such a hurry, but I’ll be in trouble if I don't make it to the meeting. Perhaps some other—” Horrified at what her lips are about to say, daring herself to say it anyway, she stops herself before completing the sentence. The utter incompleteness of her response hangs painfully in the air. Turning, she rushes out the open door.
To the safety of the elevator.
As the doors seal shut behind her, she fumbles in a pocket and pulls out a plastic box small enough to hide in her palm. Pressing on the side, the lid pops up. She takes out a slender tube, raises it to her lips and takes a slow, deep inhale of the colored mist.