by Gemma Fowler
‘You have to see.’
Aggie shivered. The sun had gone, replaced by cold white walls. The interview rooms in the United Facility, journalists flashing their cameras in her face, security hurting her as they pulled her away.
‘You have to see,’ Celeste repeated.
The room spun again and Aggie collapsed in a ball on the ground.
She lifted her head. Birdsong drifted on the warm breeze. The hush of grasses was all around her, the soft lapping of cool water on the rocky black beach. Aggie stood up. Behind her, on the crest of the hill, stood a small blue-and-white house. A wide porch wrapped right around, sheltering two rocking chairs that pointed out towards the sea.
Her father’s house. Her favourite place in the world.
Aggie bent down and ran her hands through the long grass, the smell of sea salt and soil made her feel giddy. She tilted her head back, closed her eyes and let the fresh breeze lift her hair and dry the tears on her cheeks.
‘You have to see.’
Aggie’s eyes snapped back open.
The jagged rocks of the Far Side jutted angrily around her. And at her feet . . . Danny, wearing the old suit Aggie had found on the border, his eyes staring blindly out from behind the visor. His mouth moved, ‘You have to see.’
Aggie screamed. ‘I don’t see! I don’t see!’
Terrified, she turned and tripped over another body. Every pile of dust was an old spacesuit. Thousands of bodies littering the landscape as far as the horizon.
‘I don’t see. Let me out. Please. Celeste, stop it.’ Aggie sobbed. ‘Please, make it stop. I don’t see, I don’t see.’
A massive pulse swept across Aggie’s vision, sending a sharp pain across her forehead and a rush of white noise into her ears, so high and loud that she thought it would rip her head apart. She cried out and felt rough hands on her shoulders.
*
‘Aggie!’ a voice vibrated. ‘Come back! Dude, seriously, you’ve got to wake up!’
‘Seb?’ she said groggily, as a dark shape emerged out of the darkness.
She felt a ripping sensation as Seb pulled off the electrodes that connected her to the computer. ‘We gotta get out of here,’ he hissed, ‘like five minutes ago.’
Aggie came around, finally. The edges of the room were tinged red. ‘Wh-what’s going on?’ she whispered.
‘Rix knows you’re here,’ Seb said breathlessly. ‘We have to go.’
He hauled Aggie to her feet and dragged her out of the Home Ether room and into a tiny maintenance corridor covered in wires and switches.
Aggie’s head pounded, she couldn’t stop shaking. She felt weak and scared. The image of Danny’s dead face mouthing Celeste’s words replayed over and over. Her feet refused to work properly and Seb ended up half-carrying her for most of the way. Aggie pressed herself up against him, so close she could hear his heart beating.
Behind them footsteps echoed. ‘Guards?’ she said woozily.
‘Yes, guards,’ Seb panted, ‘Tranquillity guards too, like a whole bunch of them.’
‘Oh no,’ Aggie said, willing her legs to move faster.
They went along the snaking Tech corridors, sticking to the maintenance routes until the footsteps started to die down. Seb stopped, hauled Aggie upright again and pushed at a plain white door that was sunk into the corridor wall.
He threw Aggie into the room and slammed the door shut.
Aggie looked around. They were in a tiny Tech rec room. The only lights were the blue panels inset around a group of white benches in the centre. Spacefood vending machines lined the walls and old wrappers and half-finished drinks littered the floor. It smelt of sugar and old laundry.
Seb leant against the door, trying to catch his breath. He stared at Aggie for a long time. His expression unreadable, or maybe that was just because Aggie’s mind was doing somersaults.
‘What were you doing?’ Seb asked calmly.
Aggie hoisted herself up onto a bench and put her head in her hands. ‘I don’t know,’ she said, trying to remove the images of Celeste’s nightmare from her eyes.
‘You have to see.’
Seb huffed and started to pace the room.
Aggie looked up. ‘You came to find me.’
He stopped. ‘Yeah, I wanted the Angel of Adrianne’s fragging autograph.’ His chest was heaving under his dress overall. He was so angry.
‘Where’s Mir—?’
‘How could you do it, Aggs?’ Seb shouted suddenly, his face going red under his brown curls. ‘I mean, what else haven’t you told me, hey? Are you actually eighty-seven years old? A man, maybe? Or not even a human at all?Yeah, that’s it, you’re a fragging Rock-Alien! Oh thank the Earth, I’m not crazy after all!’
‘Seb, please don’t.’
‘A robot! A walking, talking humanoid, devoid of all feelings and emotions. Just going through life screwing with people that care about her!’
‘Seb!’
‘Who are you, Aggie? Who the frag are you? My only real friend in the world and I don’t even know who you are any more.’
‘I’m just Aggie, a lower-tier domestic analyst. That’s all that matters.’
‘Bunch of denk.’
‘Seb, nothing has changed.’
His eyes got even wider. ‘Nothing has changed? Aggie, tonight, in front of a crowd of literally billions, I learnt that my best friend is the fragging Angel of Adrianne. The Angel. Of. Adrianne. The Child of Hope. My friend Aggie, the crazy-haired, clumsiest human in the world who samples urine for a living is the Child of Hope!’
‘I’m just me.’
‘And then I go backstage, so I can shout at you, and I see you running into the cargo tunnels, with half of Rix’s guards looking for you! Seriously, what’s wrong with you?’
Aggie looked up. ‘You followed me?’ she said hopefully, ‘You came to find me?’
Seb wasn’t listening. ‘I mean, I knew you had connections in the company, but David Shepard’s daughter? Adam Faulkner’s adopted daughter? Is that for real?’
Aggie nodded slowly, tears running down her face. ‘I’m sorry, Seb. I tried to tell you so many times.’
‘Oh yeah, because I can imagine it was hard to find a moment to do that in five years. Aggie, we’ve been hanging out and talking crap for five years! Do you not think “Oh, BTW Seb, don’t know if you’re bothered or anything but I’m basically the most famous person in the world”, is a bit more important than “How would we survive a Lunar Base zombie apocalypse?”’
Aggie tried to smile. ‘Hey, Lunar Base zombie apocalypses are a real threat.’
Seb didn’t smile. He was really mad. More than Aggie had ever seen before. She didn’t really blame him.
He threw himself down onto the bench and looked right into her naked, violet eyes.
He paused for a moment.
‘What?’
‘Nothing. It’s just they’re kind of terrifyingly beautiful.’
‘Is that supposed to be nice?’
Seb shook his head. ‘My Aggie’s eyes are blue.’
The look he was giving her was tearing at Aggie’s soul. She should have told him. She should have told him years ago. She couldn’t lose him now. Not like this.
‘Seb, please. I don’t know what else to say. Please don’t be like this, I can’t stand it. I need you.’
She tried to grab his arm but he pulled away.
‘Seb, even I used to forget I was her. There are posters everywhere, but it’s always been like looking at someone else. I was just a kid. I was a different person back then.’
‘No, Aggs, NOW you’re a different person. Right now.’
‘No I’m not! How can different-coloured eyes make me a different person?’
‘You’ve made me feel like a clagger’s ass, Aggie.’ He turned back to her, his eyes cold. Aggie had never seen Seb look like that before.
‘Look, man, I helped you. But this –’ he gestured a shaking hand between them – ‘I dunno, Aggs. Maybe we need
some space.You’re obviously going through a lot right now—’
‘And I need you more than any other time!’ Aggie cried, not caring if Rix and his men heard her.
Seb’s face softened. ‘Hey, look, I’m not going anywhere, OK? I’m not . . . aw, man, Aggie, this whole thing has blown my tiny mind. I just need to . . . I mean, I don’t know if I can be like I was with you, knowing all this stuff.’
Aggie felt all the life seeping out of her. Seb was her strength. Without him, she couldn’t even breathe properly. She was terrified. Did he have any idea how much she needed him? Why was he talking to her as if she was a stranger? His voice was different, the way he sounded when she called him on shift and the other guards were listening. She didn’t want Seb’s work voice, she was Aggie. His Aggie.
‘Please don’t do this,’ she said thickly.
‘I’m sorry, Aggs. I just . . .’ Seb opened the door. ‘I’ll see you around, I guess.’
‘Seb!’
He slipped away into the corridor.
*
Aggie sat in the dank blue light unable to move. She stayed for what felt like hours, but it must have been minutes, because when she finally opened the door, she could hear the distant ring of voices. Rix’s guards.
The corridors here were narrow and cluttered with wires and low-hanging pipes. She stepped out of the rec room gingerly, then stopped.
Rix was standing among the wires ahead of her. His face looked ugly in the low light – tightened with anger.
Aggie turned, but found her way back blocked by six huge Tranquillity guards. Mir stood in the centre of them, her dress uniform sparkling. She looked as terrified as Aggie did.
Without a word, Rix threw his protein pack down on the ground and walked up to her. Aggie felt as if she was carved from moon rock. Too scared to move. Rix had that look in his eye that terrified Aggie. Bright and manic and unpredictable. The gang tattoo was pulled tight across his jaw – the commander did not enjoy being disobeyed.
He looked at the ground for a long time. Then:
‘Look’s like our Angel needs to have her wings clipped,’ he whispered.
There was a spit of electricity, a flash of violet in the dull corridor.
‘Aggie! Look out!’ Mir cried, stepping forwards and trying to drag Aggie back by her arm.
Rix’s buzzer arced in the dim light, bringing its evil, violet forks down on Aggie’s shoulder.
Pain convulsed over every inch of her flesh.
She heard Mir cry out.
Then, nothing.
Day-Cycle 13
A breeze ruffled Aggie’s hair.
Her father’s car, with its old sticky leather seats, floated into focus around her.
She could smell the dust and heat of the desert on the wind that came in through the windows. In the distance, the gleaming silver dome of the brand new lumite power plant rose up out of the red horizon.
‘This is against all known protocols, David,’ a familiar voice echoed from the dash. Aggie opened her eyes. A tiny Ether spun beside the old dials.
Her father’s knuckles were white on the wheel. ‘It’s a feeling, a hunch, that’s all.’
‘There’s no evidence to suggest that . . .’
‘I know, I know –’ her father shook his head – ‘but he’s stopped listening to reason.’
The Ether on the dash began to churn. ‘David . . .’
‘It’s an order, a directive, whatever you need to do,’ her father’s voice wavered. ‘If anything happens to me – please, she hasn’t got anyone else.’
The road thundered under the car’s old rubber wheels.
‘OK, David.’
The scene dissolved. Aggie swam in a sea of black so thick it felt as if she were inside the Ether itself.
The hospital pod came in and out of focus, floating in front of her for a second, then pulling away, lost in the darkness. Aggie pushed at the hospital monitor in her arm. The chip vibrated softly under her skin, administering the meds that kept her sedated. She felt her arm fall back down. If she tried to rip it out, the computer would only knock her out again. She doubted she had the strength, anyway.
This is how the days were. If they were whole days.
Aggie swallowed drily and shifted on the itchy sheets. She closed her eyes in an attempt to stop the nausea. She had to be quiet. She had to think.
When she mumbled and cried out, a nurse would shuffle in, place a cold hand on her forehead and tell her to relax, it was the healers, knitting her damaged body back together – she needed to be still, to let them do their job. She should be grateful that the guard’s buzzer was on stun. She was going to be OK. She just needed to be still for a while, that was all.
Her mind drifted to Seb. She imagined him out on the base, laughing at the custard cart with Mir, she saw him on his border patrols all alone. Out in the lonely Borderlands where he’d seen the—
The Rock-Aliens.
Something sparked in Aggie’s head, suddenly became clear.
She pulled herself up in the bed and opened her eyes. The room swayed around her. She felt as if something dark and horrible had crept up and bitten her. Why hadn’t she seen it before? It was so obvious now.
Aggie pulled the sheets off the bed and tried to sit up.
In her preoccupation with the Angel, Aggie had missed something. Something much darker. Something to do with the old suit under her bed. Something that, for reasons Aggie still didn’t completely understand, Celeste wanted her to see.
No one had told her how long she’d been in the Tranquillity hospital wing – the medics refused to say. But, judging by the state of her injuries, she’d guessed it was a while. Rix had hit her with the buzzer on stun, knowing that the nano-healers in the hospital would eventually reverse any damage the shock caused. It was a warning. She was his now. On the base, the commander could do whatever he wanted to keep his property in line.
The official story was that the Angel had been ‘overcome with emotion’ after the party, and needed rest.
Just the thought of it made Aggie’s skin crawl.
Aggie had had no idea that Tranquillity had a hospital wing, but it kind of made sense: it had its own shuttle pad and dorms, and it wasn’t as if the board of directors would put up with convalescing with the riff-raff in the Civilian Sector.
Aggie groaned. The sedation meds for the healers had worn off, but she was still as good as trapped. Even the slightest movement sent pain thudding through her whole body. She badly wanted to move. She couldn’t just lie here; her thoughts were pulling her somewhere else.
She looked to the side of her bed. An empty frozen custard pot, filled with silvery Spacefood packets, sat on the small plastic table, beside the piles of fruit-based ‘gifts’ given to her by ‘admirers’, and the bizarre ‘get well soon’ statue from Astrid and the ERMs. There was no note on the pot, but Aggie didn’t need one. Seb might not be speaking to her, officially, but the medics had told her that a guard with curly hair had been by her side every day when she was unconscious. It made Aggie want to cry.
‘Ah, finally!’ A familiar voice drifted over the beeping of medical equipment. ‘How are you feeling?’
Aggie might be hidden away in Tranquillity, but she hadn’t been short of visitors.
Mir was currently sitting in an armchair on the other side of the room, her head buried in the comms pad that contained a petabyte of goodwill messages from Earth.
‘Did you know you have a vid from the president of the Chinese Territories on here? And the elected leader of Scandinavia,’ she said, flicking the screen. ‘Honestly, Aggie, this reads like a who’s who of the United Earth!’ She turned the pad to Aggie. The face of a woman whom Aggie didn’t recognize was on the screen.
Aggie huffed and pushed the button that administered her painkillers. She hadn’t read the messages. She hadn’t had the strength to do anything but think. And her thoughts were driving her crazy.
‘I think I need to rest,’ she sighed into
her pillow. Take the hint, Mir.
‘Hey Agatha, you have already had the recommended eight-point-one hours of sleep today,’ Celeste chimed from the other side of the room. ‘Any more would actually be detrimental to your recovery.’
The computer’s voice made the hairs on Aggie’s arms stand up.
‘Cosmic, Celeste,’ Aggie grunted, returning Mir’s smile. ‘Totally cosmic.’
The Mir-bot had been stuck in full ‘nice mode’ ever since the incident with Rix. She’d used her efficiency superpowers to great effect, arranging Aggie’s visitors, revising her schedules and, most annoyingly, keeping her company. Aggie suspected it was all to do with guilt. Aggie bit her lip to stop from asking her about Seb.
Instead, Aggie took a deep breath and said the thing she should have said days ago. ‘Thank you, by the way. For warning me.’
Mir shook her head, a sad look washing over her face. ‘I still can’t believe he would do that,’ she whispered.
Aggie remembered the look in Rix’s eyes. She could.
Both girls glanced at Celeste. A silent understanding passed between them. Right now, even their thoughts were dangerous.
The Ether rippled in its frame on the other side of the room. Aggie’s vitals skittered across its surface, supplied by the raised square under the skin of her forearm. She looked down at the implant. It still felt like hostile alien technology. For the fiftieth time, Aggie considered ripping it out, but they’d only put in another.
‘Well, Aggie,’ Mir said after a few more awkward minutes. ‘I have good news.’
‘You’re not engaged, are you?’ Aggie mumbled.
Mir rolled her eyes. ‘No, of course not. Though Seb is fine, by the way. He’ll be pleased that you asked about him.’
Aggie grunted. They were official now? She couldn’t bring herself to ask.
‘It’s hurting him, Aggie.’ Mir sighed. ‘And it’s hurting me too, actually. Of course we have our differences, but I hate to see you fighting’
‘We’re not fighting about that,’ Aggie muttered.
Mir gestured towards Aggie. ‘I meant this. You!’