Selfless Series Box Set

by S Breaker

  A pair of air drones flew toward the three of them, as they approached the courtyard, to escort them into the reception.

  Laney glanced over at Maia and Berry-bot, feeling apprehensive, and was glad that Maia had lent her a different, more formal type of trench coat for the reception, similar to the one Maia herself was wearing.

  Laney also felt a bit strange about having left P.T. at the lab. She felt like P.T. had been the one constant thing she’d always had with her on this trip so far, almost like a security blanket. But Maia had suggested that it would not be appropriate to bring the little robot to the President’s reception.

  Laney looked up at the sculpted coat of arms above the set of huge classical columns, lit up in bright lights, as she followed behind Maia coming up the steps, and the drones led them through the ornate wooden revolving doors leading inside the building, across the checked-tile floor lobby, and down the hallway to the banquet room.

  Laney’s breath caught in her throat as they arrived.

  The banquet room was a semi-circle-shaped room, with tiered-light chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, brocade curtains, a large modern mural on the wall, and holographic mood lighting across the wooden floor panels. The room was bordered by ceiling-high windows, outside of which you could see the city, sparkling in the orange sunset light, and right down to the harbor.

  There was already quite a crowd at the reception and when Laney looked up, a familiar face was by the doorway. “Hey,” she said, looking surprised. “You’re here too.”

  Kevin’s eyes lit up as he smiled at her. “Hi Laney,” he greeted, then glanced behind her at Maia and Berry-AI. “Hi, guys, what are you all doing here?”

  “Noah said he needed to debrief the President over something. Probably something about the last eight months,” Laney explained.

  “Oh.” Kevin nodded. “Yeah, sure, of course.”

  Maia was already eyeing a plate of hors d’oeuvres coming around, propped on another air drone, while Berry-AI just stood looking around the banquet room as if taking in every detail of the place for a report or something.

  Laney glanced briefly at the two of them before she turned back to Kevin, tilting her head to one side. “Why are you here?”

  “Oh, I’m here for the Powwow,” Kevin replied. “I’m Tech Support.”

  “Seriously?”

  “The President takes Game Nights very seriously,” Kevin relayed. “He hosts it across the entire country, ‘cause why not, right?” He shrugged. “But it’s been a bit more problematic recently because there are a lot more intricacies involved in Flight Sim games. For a couple of years, we just used to have DND and DOTA. Then, President Lineham turned twelve and suddenly Flight Sims were the shit,” he added with a grin.

  Laney laughed.

  “Well, I for one am glad he stopped hosting DOTA Game Nights,” Maia spoke up. “I mean, how do you even get any work done when you’re trying to work on your strategy, learning all the new heroes’ skills, and making sure your wards keep killing it all night, right?”

  Laney laughed again, shaking her head. It was so easy to forget sometimes that she was in a room full of accomplished scientists and geniuses and mathematicians and economists and politicians.

  If anything, Laney thought, looking around in wonder, the President’s reception sort of felt like a prom—a Victorian-themed masked ball.

  “The Powwow doesn’t start until later,” Kevin said before offering. “In the meantime, would you girls like something to drink?”

  Laney raised her eyebrows in mocking. “What, Yoohoo? Milkshakes?”

  Maia looked at her strangely. “What’s a Yoohoo?”

  But Berry-AI interjected before Laney could answer. “Actually, Wellington is the Craft Beer capital of the world. We manufacture every kind of beer imaginable. Light beer, dark beer, pale ales, brown ales, stouts, porters…”

  Laney’s mouth formed an ‘o’. She supposed with a world full of kids, a ‘drinking age’ was probably something that had been thrown out the window earlier on.

  Kevin studied her expression with narrowed eyes. “You know what, I’ll get you something good,” he said with another smile before he turned to walk away.

  Maia elbowed Laney, grinning. “He’s such a gentleman.”

  And Laney colored slightly. Yup. That was Kevin.

  Masked

  Kevin had brought them some fizzy cider, which Laney decided tasted pretty good before he was summoned away to troubleshoot something. And Maia had gone on to walk around and mingle with the crowd, dragging Laney and Berry-AI along.

  Laney was well aware that she was supposed to be keeping her socializing down to a minimum, but Maia had different ideas.

  “Dasvidaniya,” Laney bid the guy wearing a top hat and a crisp blue tux who gave her a smile before he walked away.

  Maia shot Laney an impressed look. “Wow, that was amazing,” she remarked.

  Laney had done it again and had managed to converse with the Russian representative for the U.N. entirely in Russian.

  Admittedly, it didn’t feel as creepy to do when she knew why she was able to do it. Although, she was hoping that that was the only ‘bleed through’ that would come out tonight. She didn’t want to ruin a perfectly good party.

  “Oh, look.” Maia nudged her again, gesturing across the room. “There’s the U.N. representative for Germany talking to her American counterpart.”

  Laney sipped her drink as she followed Maia’s gaze toward the elegant, tall, blonde girl wearing a corseted dress, who was talking to another girl wearing a bohemian-style long dress and a carnation feathered hat over her wild frizzy hair. “Wow,” she mumbled.

  The two girls both seemed to glance up in Laney’s direction before resuming their conversation.

  Laney glanced across the room and spotted a guy wearing a kimono-style outfit and guessed he was the Japanese representative, and she paused at a thought. “So, do all the old countries each get a representative?”

  Berry-AI spoke up. “Each former country whose population makes up a significant percentage of The Community has a representative in the government, as well as others who have largely retained their cultural identity. It was noted in a study by Dr. Mary Douglas that it was especially the particularly rigid cultures that have survived the cascade bomb event.”

  Laney smiled to herself. “Fascinating…”

  “There goes the oldest guy in the world.” Maia gestured across the room, toward the older gentleman standing by the refreshments table. “Dr. Rosenblatt,” she relayed. “I’m actually amazed he’s out this late.”

  Laney looked over. “He doesn’t look any older than my dad,” she noted, looking puzzled.

  “Oh, I think he’s like in his thirties,” Maia said. “Really old. I’m waiting for his lab space to open up, you know, later. It’s absolutely amazing,” she commented. “It’s like twice the size of mine.”

  “Dr. Rosenblatt’s laboratory space is exactly twice the size of Dr. Chambers’ lab,” Berry-AI put in.

  “Yeah,” Maia piped up. “But everyone knows he just got it on the grounds of seniority.”

  Laney’s shoulders shook slightly in mirth, most especially at Maia’s absolutely blasé attitude toward her possibly succeeding someone else’s lab space, which would only ever happen for one terribly grim reason. “That’s cold, Maia,” she remarked.

  “What?” Maia shrugged. “We all only have a few short years for our scientific contributions to matter. We have to ensure our time is utilized efficiently.”

  Laney shook her head. She was still continually amazed at the level of everyone’s ambition and drive—and arrogance, but she figured given the circumstances of their world, it was to be expected.

  “Hey.” Maia nudged Laney again. “Look,” she said, pointing across the room at another girl. “There goes Noah’s ex-girlfriend.”

  Laney’s eyes lit up. “Noah’s what?” She looked over, spotting the delicate-looking, petite girl among another gr
oup of people, just as the girl averted her gaze away. The girl had straight black hair and beautiful, big eyes, framed by impossibly-long eyelashes. “Wow, she’s really pretty.”

  “Sure,” Maia huffed. “For a medical doctor.”

  “Dr. Li is a cardiac surgeon,” Berry-AI relayed. “She attends the cardiac ward up at the Wellington hospital.”

  Laney made a face. “She’s a doctor?” She felt her stomach turn over in a stark reminder that she really must be the dumbest girl on this planet.

  Maia gave her a look. “Oh, don’t worry,” she dismissed. “They only went out for a few months. Noah totally likes you better, I can tell.”

  “You mean he likes the ‘real’ Dr. Laney Carter better—the genius one,” Laney corrected.

  Maia shook her head, a smirk on her lips. “Um, I most definitely did not mean that.”

  Laney shot her a look of ridicule. “Shut up.”

  “You know, Noah’s a really great guy,” Maia started, her voice lowered. “He might seem stand-offish at the beginning, but I think that’s just all that military training. Back in our University days, he was always the first one to volunteer to teach the younger children, and he always did it with such enthusiasm and patience.”

  “He did?” Laney looked surprised.

  “He’s also incredibly loyal.”

  She recalled how Noah protected Eleanor’s memory at every turn. “Yes, he is, isn’t he?” She narrowed her eyes, looking around again. She met the gazes of another two girls across the way who were whispering together before they turned their backs to her.

  Okay, that was weird. Laney frowned. “Hey Maia,” she started. “I know I’m probably just imagining this, but I feel like…everyone’s staring at me.”

  Maia looked around. “Oh. No, that’s not your imagination,” she said. “That’s just all the girls. They’re jealous.”

  “Jealous? Of me? Why?” she asked, in ridicule.

  She shot her a look. “Everyone knows you’re with Dr. Noah Donovan. He’s like Number 2 in the Rock Stars of Physics Hall of Fame.”

  Berry-AI gestured with his hand. “Perhaps I can put it in a way that you might understand, Miss Carter. I believe it is similar to what you would call on your world ‘dating the school quarterback’.”

  “But we’re not dating!” Laney pointed out indignantly. “We’re not even together, like at all.”

  “Obviously, that doesn’t matter,” Maia responded, her eyebrows raised.

  “Pfft, well, that’s just ridiculous.” Laney rolled her eyes. “Rock Stars of Physics,” she mumbled in mocking. “If he’s Number 2, who’s Number 1?” she wanted to know.

  Maia grinned at her, looking amused already. “You are.”

  “What?”

  “I mean, the other Laney—I mean, you know what I mean.” Maia waved carelessly. “She’s such a legend. Especially now,” she said ruefully, shaking her head again. “It’s like Marie Curie all over again. When your own work destroys you.”

  Laney shot her a look. “What do you mean?”

  “Well, you know, Curie discovered radium and she died of radiation poisoning. Ipso facto, Laney discovered the quantum shear and—ergo.”

  Laney’s eyes nearly popped out of her face. “She what?”

  Maia clapped her hand over her mouth. “Oh shit, I forgot. You didn’t remember yet.”

  Laney was frozen in shock. “Maia,” she warned. “Did you just tell me that the other Laney got killed by a quantum shear?”

  Maia wrinkled her nose. “Not necessarily,” she said. “I mean, technically, she got sucked into the event horizon, dissolving all her atoms altogether, but you know.” She shrugged with a forced smile. “Who cares about the details, really?”

  Laney’s jaw dropped. “She-she…dissolved?”

  Maia gritted her teeth, making a grotesque face in guilt. “I’m so sorry—!”

  A bell rang just then and Laney looked up toward the doorway to see a few people entering the room. She guessed it must have been the President and his delegation arriving at the reception.

  Laney spotted Noah enter the room with them, and when he glanced over, he easily found her in the crowd and met her gaze. But the entire Presidential delegation was walking over toward Laney anyway.

  Maia spotted them too, her eyes wide. “Oh, you know what?” She took Berry-AI’s arm. “I think we’d better…go check out those mini-burgers on that drone over there.”

  Berry-AI tilted his head. “But I cannot consume food, Dr. Chambers.”

  “Just come on,” Maia hissed, dragging Berry-AI away with her, and leaving Laney alone.

  Laney straightened up apprehensively, trying to quickly compose herself from the incredible shock of Maia’s revelation before she turned to face the twelve-year-old boy and his entourage walking up to her.

  “Miss Carter.” President Lineham’s hand was already extended. “It’s nice to finally meet you.”

  A girl who looked to be about Laney’s age came up to stand beside the President and she put her hand out to shake hers next. “Hi Laney, I’m Prime Minister Maloney,” she said with a smile.

  “Wow,” Laney breathed in amazement. “It’s—it’s an honor to meet you both,” she said, shaking hands with them both.

  She noted that in spite of their age, both the President and the Prime Minister seemed to exude a worldly, regal aura, and Laney did not doubt at all that they were in fact, the highest leaders of this world.

  “We do extend our deepest and sincerest apologies for what happened when you were here last time,” President Lineham began, his tone gracious.

  Laney opened her mouth to respond.

  Everything was falling into place—the reason why nobody would tell her what had happened last time, what had happened to the real Laney, why the President himself felt the need to deliver a personal apology. It was no wonder everyone was so skittish about discussing what happened eight months ago. The real Laney had tragically died!

  But Noah spoke up first. “We are still working on recovering her memories from that time, Mr. President.”

  “Oh, yeah, sure.” He nodded in acknowledgment.

  But then Prime Minister Maloney rolled her eyes. “I told you that Blakely was nothing but a troublemaker,” she mumbled under her breath, dropping her regal façade for a moment.

  President Lineham blew out a breath in exasperation as if he was already expecting her to comment on that. “Yes Janet, I realize now that was a mistake. But we can’t all be perfect like my predecessor, old President Nichols, can we?”

  Prime Minister Maloney sighed, exasperated. “Please Michael, don’t get started on your guilt-fishing trip,” she said. “President Nichols has been gone for two years. You can’t keep bringing him up every time you need to ace an argument.”

  “Not if you’re going to make me feel like I’ll be in his shadow forever,” President Lineham pointed out.

  “Maybe if you didn’t insist on imagining subtext everywhere and reading between the lines when there’s absolutely nothing there. Sometimes what a person says is exactly just what they mean. This isn’t Psych 101,” Prime Minister said, her eyebrows raised.

  It was like they were two siblings having at it.

  Laney pursed her lips as she watched their back and forth, observing with amusement that there were still obviously some aspects of maturity a person really had to grow into, as it couldn’t simply develop in spite of a genetic mutation.

  “Whatever. The point is,” President Lineham spoke up with authority. “We regret what happened and we are doing our utmost to ensure that nothing like it ever happens again. Our first concerns, of course, are the best interests of all the citizens in The Community,” he stated, then he met Laney’s gaze again as if satisfied with himself.

  “Thank you, Mr. President, Prime Minister.” Laney gave them a grateful nod. “I’ll be sure to remember that when I get my memories back.” She met Noah’s gaze and he gave her a short nod of recognition. “By the way
…I was curious,” she went on, turning back to the President and Prime Minister again. “Is it true that the people in The Community are not all aware what happened at GNR eight months ago? I guess you’re probably still just planning the public statement about the incident. Seems important.”

  Noah shot her a quick warning look.

  President Lineham’s eyebrows furrowed, and Prime Minister Maloney looked at her, surprised.

  Laney looked at each of them. “I mean,” she continued, almost casually. “You were, of course, planning to properly honor the scientists who lost their lives, right? Maybe the scientists doing work to put everything right deserve recognition as well?” She tilted her head, seeming almost offhand. “These just seem like they’re also, as you said, in the best interest of The Community.”

  Noah’s eyes were wide in caution but he didn’t say anything.

  But President Lineham narrowed his eyes and gave her an annoyed look. “Well, I’m not sure how that’s any of your concern.”

  And Prime Minister Maloney smacked his arm.

  President Lineham winced slightly, pausing for quite a while, before regarding Laney with a look significantly different from earlier. Then when he spoke again, his tone bore an abrupt, diplomatic, but still condescending, tone. “I understand from the records that your world is quite different from this,” he began smoothly. “So it will be easy for you to look around and not realize the intricacies involved in ensuring the smooth running of a world like ours. We must be sensitive enough to know the difference between what the public needs to know and what they ought to,” he said. “We run a peaceful community and we prefer it to stay that way.”

  Prime Minister Maloney met her gaze. “Rest assured, Miss Carter,” she started, wearing her best serene smile. “We are, of course, looking into how best to properly handle the responsible dissemination of the necessary information, give credit where credit is due. But the last thing The Community needs right now is to think that this government is unable to propagate the peace that we have been privileged to enjoy for almost seventy years. You wouldn’t want to send the population into a panic now, would you?”