Virtually True

by Penenberg, Adam L.

  “That is your best? How can you guarang control the earth’s money? That amazes. Surely you are no man, American. Your cock may be big, but it’s soft.” Bong Bong squeezes an eye.

  Fire rains down from the clock tower roof. True rolls away from Bong Bong’s errant shot, which scorches a chasm into the ground. Before Bong Bong can re-shoot, he’s engulfed by heaven’s flames. A few drops spit on True. Bong Bong wails up to the moment his life is done. The flickering dies when there’s no more flesh fuel.

  Piña skateboards in from behind the curious. Checks out the smoldering remains. “Who’s that?”

  “Bong Bong.”

  Piña’s eyes bug. “No shit? Bong Bong? You did that?”

  “I thought Piña did.”

  “Must’ve been someone pissed off at the cops. Man oh man. Look at that. Napalm. Some serious shit. Everyone’ll be talking about it. Piña’s going to hire the bitch who offed Bong Bong. Holy fuck!” She steals another look at the corpse, then True. “Every time Piña sees you, you look like shit.”

  “Piña brings out the best in me.”

  “Piña’s got something for you. At home. Important. OK?”

  True needs a medkit for his splotch burns, but Piña’s never let him down. On the back of her skateboard his burns must endure wind sting.

  Napalm. The scent of terror.

  But he’s alive. A miracle.

  Piña grapples to a truck and they speed through the tunnel, past True’s apartment, to Snakeskin Alley. The mall.

  CHAPTER 27

  Piña’s home, weepy on the outside, garish, odd on the inside, a basement floor-pad hugged by armored gates. True’s often passed it en route to her arcade, but didn’t notice. Piña props her skateboard against the door and swings in on her hands. A gym takes up most of the room’s core, barbells of iron and sand trapped in plastic doughnuts, a bench, pull-up bar, ab-flexor. Trash scavenge, stuff not manufactured in years, spills over platforms, tables, wall- and ceiling-mounted cases. Posters of female bodybuilts, muscle-accordion bodies tapering up to zit-sized heads. Ropes, deep-sea fishing nets, porthole pegs cover walls, hang from the ceiling. Legs are a distinct disadvantage traversing Piña’s air trails.

  True limps to Piña’s bed, waits while she shimmies up coiled ropes, swings to a ceiling-mounted cabinet, rummages through, comes away disappointed, scales the shipping net and falls to a trapeze. She sails to another cabinet—True hopes the one with the medkit. A little ultrasound for his knee, some skin-repair for his burns, he’ll be fine. But no. Piña slides down a rope with an armful of rusty-lidded jars, drops to the bed, one bounce, two, three, slips the jars onto the night table. The concoctions smell earthy, mud, burnt leaf, and minty.

  “No medkit? Ultrasound? Skin graft bandaids?”

  She pinches his leg. “Off.”

  “Huh?”

  “Take your pants off so Piña can see the burns.”

  True stands, fights the urge to wince. “I’ll fix myself up when I get home.”

  Piña pokes him in the stomach. True falls back. “This shit’s better. Natural. All that ultra shit graft-crap eats out your insides. This shit’ll fix you up.”

  She pulls his pants over his knees, then feet while True grinds his teeth. Piña massages in goop from one jar, gobs on a second coat from the other jar. An inexact science, True thinks. She wraps a coin in toilet paper—like a chocolate kiss—lights the end, places it on one of the burns, then smothers the flame with a drinking glass. She repeats this for each burn on his back. The suction pressure increases as the oxygen is consumed, forming a vacuum, resulting in blood being pulled toward the wounds. True tries to sit up. Can’t.

  “Shut up and stay still.” Piña goes back across the room, concocting some witch’s brew. Tail of newt? Eye of okaapi? Her face is almost angelic as she blows a stray hair from her eye. Her torso, as pumped up as her poster idols, is latticed with scars, blotted with tattoos. She remembers something, takes the monkey bars to a rope, then up to a metal wire, which she slides down using a leather belt. She stops when her hand smacks a ceiling cabinet. Takes out a vial and is back in her chair in two flashes.

  Piña waits fifteen minutes, then’s back to yank the glasses off, one by one. She tips them back, holds them up to True. “See this puss? That’s bad shit from your body.”

  True checks his burns. A little tender, but OK. “Much better.”

  “Thirsty, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  Piña hands True a mug containing radioactive hues. “Some beet, garlic, carrot, parsley, onion, and tomato. Good for your blood and health.”

  True, craving vitamins, quick-gulps it, the garlic and onion particularly potent. Tingling. “That’s a powerful remedy.” True once read you could overdose on beet juice. Maybe he was too hasty in rejecting homeopathic remedies. But then he’s hit by the shakes. “What did you put in here?” He drops the mug. His limbs are dead weight. He thinks about running but can’t even stand.

  Piña picks up the mug. “A new synthnarc Piña’s been marketing. Don’t need virtual reality on this shit. You’ll feel good in a few minutes. Better than you can fucking imagine.”

  “What is it?” His jaw is clenched.

  “Like Piña told you. A synthnarc. A little lude for a nice, hard stiffy, some methyl-A for that loving feeling, some synthetic coke, and a little THC for enhancement. It’s selling great. Piña calls it ‘Lovers Ouroboros.’”

  She pulls back a strap, points to her shoulder blade, to a tattoo, the snake of everlasting destruction and regeneration, a circle of paradox. “It’s a new marketing strategy. On the street or in Piña’s arcade, you want some Lovers Ouroboros, you point to this.”

  The room, the nets, the ropes, cabinets, posters, and his own thoughts rollercoaster. Did Piña kill Aslam, set up the whole thing, take out on an assassin’s contract? Is True next? Or is this some organ donor’s nightmare? Blood boils under skin. True tries to say something but the thought butterfly-flutters only an instant, then’s gone.

  Then deep haze. Liquid ecstasy.

  * * *

  True wakes up, hands and feet bound to bed. Piña’s suctioning off glasses. She notices he’s awake, but won’t look. The last glass slurps off. Piña unties him, feet, then hands. He massages his wrists and ankles. Piña sits at bed’s edge, pretends he doesn’t exist.

  “Why?” True’s mouth is martini-parched.

  Piña steals a glance. Says something to herself, mouths “fuck,” takes his hand, kisses it, the hint of a bite. “You’re different. You’re like real-life what they got on TV. Piña don’t know nobody like it. You’re guarang but more delicate than other guarang, like a bird or something. True’s good for Piña. Not a psycho or boy whore. Piña’s in love.”

  True remembers the way his molecules marched after the first drug hit. Piña took control. Squeezed his arms until they popped purple. Choked and close-fisted him, pretzeled his arms behind his back while he: No! Stop! but she kept on, sucking pleasure from his agony. She fucked him savagely, her steely arms clamped around his waist, tighter closer to climax, squeezing, then damp groans as soundtrack to her crushing grip, asphyxiation. He tries to deny it, but he too experienced churning, pining sextasy.

  He’s helium-headed, uneasy on his feet. “I have to go.”

  “Piña’ll help.”

  “You’ve done enough.”

  Quiet. Then rusty rasps. Piña’s tears.

  He should have seen this coming but then thinks, just like the victim to blame himself. Her chiseled physique heaving tears makes him think of time as a sculpture, how it’s shaped by the individual. He has things to do before it’s too late. To shape his own destiny.

  True opens the door to distant, muddy explosions.

  * * *

  True calls Eden from a public telelink bank. She offers no hint of their earlier scuffle.

  “Prehistoric equipment. Not even visual, just sound,” she says.

  “ I hear war sfx. Any battles nearby?”
>
  “Where are you now?”

  “Town’s center.”

  Her fingers a blur on the touchscreen. “Go north three clicks. There’s a Sato installation under fire from ADC clones. Maxi Khoompootla’s been transmitting footage of the build-up.”

  “Who are Sato’s proxies?”

  “Mercenaries.”

  “I’m on my way.” He waits for her to tell him not to go. Nothing.

  True wishes he had his wrist-top. Imagines it’s melded to whatever’s left of Bong Bong.

  CHAPTER 28

  From the side of the road, True watches the American Defense Corps clone army division march in sharp rows. Human technology patented, raised in vats, trained for a purpose, strictly regulated by Global Fortune 1000 by-laws. True wonders if he gets close enough if he’ll see warning labels printed on their feet. Directions for battery replacement? Voltage and safety instructions? Clone faces are drained of fear, that part of the brain distilled into licit—and illicit—drugs. Headsets relay instructions: where to go, what to do, when to fire, attack, their whole operation supervised by one grand military strategist; who, so far as True knows, could be a either a supercomputer or some drugged-up video game stud.

  True spots Maxi Khoompootla across the boulevard, scanning the troops. Maxi has lost stones since last True saw him. Or did he imagine Maxi? No, True was in real-time at the refugee center. True dodges thrusting clone boots and slides through. Sidles up to Maxi, notices a festering wound on his arm.

  “You should have that laser burn looked at.”

  Maxi’s head is too big for his twiggy body, eyes peering from beneath an oil-skin hat. Not the same robust Maxi of weeks ago. He laughs. “What? This little bewdie?” Points to the wound. “Looks like chunder, don’t it?”

  “Chunder is … ?”

  “Vomit. Spew, mate.”

  “Looks like a laser wound. We should find a medkit.”

  “Nah. A whore’s lurk. Cut me when I wouldn’t pay up. No worries, mate. ’Sides, got to fossick for war footage. You know how it is.”

  “You’ve dropped a lot of weight.”

  “AIDS. Put off using the vaccine, but she’ll be right soon. Thought you were dead. Bit it in the Urban Survival Tourney.”

  “A premature report. Aren’t you worried about being so close to the action?”

  Clones continue to flow, thicker now. In the distance, fortified bunkers leading to an industrial park. Luzonians and tourists have lined up along the boulevard. A fin-de-siècle mentality—Mardi Gras even.

  Maxi takes off his hat, wipes the sweat from his forehead with his elbow, puts it back on. “Clones are programmed to hit only assigned DNA targets. And weapon tonnage is strictly limited by the Global Fortune 1000. No nukes, no big blows, no civvies are to be hit. Those are the rules.”

  “Those are mercenaries by that factory down there?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Their DNA’s been scanned by satellite?”

  “Righto.”

  “Sato’s mercs?”

  “That’s it. Bunch of bloody no-hopers. Couldn’t find the loo in a pub.”

  “What are the clones attacking?”

  “A sneaker factory.”

  “A sneaker factory? If the mercs want to run, they’ll have the right footwear.”

  Maxi laughs, sounds like a squeaky screen door opening, closing. “A lot of factories down there, but Sato’s a majority investor in that bugger there. The rest are to be left alone or ADC’ll have to pay restitution.”

  “Could get expensive.”

  Maxi doesn’t hear him. “Can you believe this bulldust? Corp warfare? It’s finally happened. Why aren’t you recording, mate?”

  “It’s your scoop. Working on something else. Mind if I watch your screen?”

  “Don’t come the raw prawn with me. What’s your biz?”

  Where to start? “Had a run in with Bong Bong in the shanties. He got my wrist-top. I got out alive.”

  Maxi scratches his head through his hat. “Bong Bong’s been bonked? You pulling my dick?”

  “He’s dead.”

  “That bloody ocker feel a lot of pain when he got offed?”

  “Homemade napalm.”

  “Ouch!” Maxi reaches into his pocket. Takes out a wrist-top transmitter. Ancient: 2-3 years old, but it’ll work. Eden can clean up transmission if need be. “I owe you, mate. Every journo who’s ever been stuck in this never-never land does. Take a spare.”

  “Thanks.” True sets up a link with Eden. Posts the images.

  “I’m getting the pix. What do you want me to do?” Eden asks.

  “Send them direct to WWTV head office in New York. Tell them it’s me transmitting.” Technically, True is required to have all footage edited and approved by the anchor. But WWTV isn’t going to turn down primo war footage.

  The clones are collecting at the bottom, on an equal plain with the mercenary army. They are like a well-conceived business plan: neat, crisp, clean, in stark contrast to the rag-tag mercenary force. True’s eyes blur over the thousands of cloned troops on the move, identical goggles and uniforms, the same height, weight, build, all bred for battle.

  The mercenaries fire first, low-wattage lasers, the color of concentrated urine. True and Maxi film it, both automatically enhancing the color. One hundred percent attention focused on their wrist-top 3-D screens. True sees all the action via his wrist-top recording, feels like he’s in an action movie himself, with his gangly sidekick Maxi. He can almost see the script unfold.

  MAXI

  (ducking as airborne debris rains down around him)

  Whoo! Would rather cauterize me own wound.

  TRUE

  (breaking his 3-D screen into 16 separate action scenes, zooming in at will, fingers dancing over the touchscreen)

  Here. Cover your wound with this.

  PULL BACK TO REVEAL

  TRUE, who’s stopped typing long enough to rip a piece of his shirt off, handing the strip to MAXI, who uses it for a makeshift sling. Both back to filming, expressions grim.

  CUT TO

  THE BATTLEFIELD: from where they are, quite a distance, down the hill. They feel safe here. Other thrill-seekers mill about. A pickpocket works the crowd, mostly robbing tourists, legs ghostly white, their skin splotched by early-stage melanoma.

  ZOOM IN ON

  THE FACTORY, which is pummeled by CLONE artillery, bullets and searing laser-fire. A wall disintegrates, topples on some dug-in mercenaries. The noise is deafening, even from TRUE and MAXI’s vantage point. Bedlam.

  CUT TO

  TRUE taking in the action on his wrist-top.

  ZOOM IN ON

  TRUE’s screen, still divided into 16 sections with 16 different camera angles, 16 miniature battles playing out at the same time.

  CUT TO

  WITHIN THE SCREEN, a CLONE firing his laser at a BOY, maybe of Pakistani descent, maybe Indian, and the BOY is cleanly severed. Legs lie a meter or two away. The boy’s arms are wrapped around his torso, his mouth is contorted in agony. TRUE cannot mike his screams over the hubbub, but knows he can overdub them later. The factory is popcorned with artillery, splashed by lasers. It crumbles.

  MAXI

  Look at them shoes in the rubble. As soon as this is over, these Luzonian looters going to have themselves a party.

  CUT TO

  MERCENARIES on the run, retreating, and in some cases, circling back around the CLONES, racing around the hill and up the sides toward True and Maxi. The battle is now over the land under the factory and the CLONES have the upper hand. The sounds of battle, juked up on TRUE and MAXI’s receivers, get louder as MERCENARIES swarm toward them, the battlefield shifting as CLONES take up positions on Sato factory land. A nearby factory—another company, another country—lies untouched. The CLONES secure the land, working smoothly, while other CLONES give chase to the MERCENARIES.

  CUT TO

  A laser streaking over TRUE and MAXI’s heads.

  MAXI

 
(checking his hat for damage)

  That was too close.

  TRUE

  We have to get out of here. The mercs can shoot whoever they want, journos included.

  MAXI

  Too right.

  TRUE

  They under the standard merc contract?

  MAXI

  That’s right. They lose, they get nothing.

  TRUE

  Not much incentive for a neat little war, is there?

  MAXI

  GDAYGDAYGDAY.

  TRUE

  What?

  MAXI

  (shouting red)

  I said not from their perspective.

  CUT TO

  MERCENARIES flooding their only rear guard route of escape. TRUE and MAXI are hemmed in on all sides. CLONES are fortified in front of them, protecting newly conquered territory.

  TRUE

  We’ve got to get out of here.

  MAXI

  How?

  CUT TO

  An explosion rocking the hill, and TRUE and MAXI stumble trying to retain their balance. A tourist is hit by whistling shrapnel, falls to the ground screaming. There’s panic, as the crowd of onlookers races in five different directions at once. A CONVENIENCE STORE is hit and shortly after beer and soda fizz out on the street. Other liquids as well. A few desperate onlookers fling themselves on the rising tide of soft drinks, lapping at it with their tongues.