by JA Huss
“Who would be able to do something like that?” And then it hits me. Her boyfriend. Lincoln Wade is supposed to be some kind of genius hacker, right?
She reads my mind and turns away. “It’s not us, Lulu. None of what’s been happening down in Cathedral City is because of us. And I’m not saying we don’t have plans for that city.” She sends me a sidelong glance over her shoulder. “And if you report that to your boss, I’ll deny it. We do have plans. But not these plans. It’s not us.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT - CASE
It’s so beautiful. It’s never looked more beautiful. The mountains around Cathedral City stand tall like a wall made by the gods. And I guess the first thing people ask themselves about a wall is… who are they trying to keep out?
But I’ve known for a long, long time that’s not the right question.
Who are they trying to keep in?
“Case?” It’s Sheila’s voice. Is it strange that a machine—or maybe even just the essence of a machine, when you really think about it—has a voice?
Focus, Case.
“Case?” she asks again. “I think you should open your eyes.”
I don’t think I have eyes anymore. And if I do, they’re about as far open as they get.
The looming mountains with the thunderhead clouds that seem to be perpetually billowing over them. The tall, brightly-lit buildings dominating the center of the valley. The ebb and flow of traffic across the side streets, and main streets, and freeways—all moving towards a destination like pre-programmed ground drones.
And the people?
Who cares about the people? The people are the problem.
“Open your eyes, Case.” Sheila’s urging is more insistent now.
I can see everything.
“Hey, buddy?” Linc’s voice with a strategic hand on my shoulder. “You’re OK now. Wake up, man. This is getting old. I’d like to go upstairs and get a beer and fuck my soon-to-be wife.”
That halts the imagery floating through my subconscious. “Wife?” I croak out.
A trio of soft exhaled breaths laced with relief fills the quiet space around me.
“We were gonna keep it a secret just a little longer, but yeah, man. It’s gonna be a big party and you need to be there, you know? I couldn’t possibly get married without you.”
Who cares about the people?
I shake my head and immediately regret it when a wave of nausea hits my stomach, making me roll over and grasp at my gut.
“Whoa,” Thomas says, blocking my attempt to roll off the hard, operating room chair. “Just take it easy. Try the eyeballs first, Case. Then we can discuss what comes next.”
“We’re going to sedate you again, Case.” Sheila is back. “That was phase one. We had to make sure you were still in there before we turn the nanites on.”
Fucking nanites. I forgot about that.
“Open your eyes, Case.” Lincoln’s good-natured joking about marrying Molly is gone now. He’s back to business.
I do. I open them and the Cathedral City dreamworld fades away. “How the fuck did I get here?”
“Lulu called me in a panic,” Thomas says. “She found you naked, up on the roof, lying in a pool of blood. What the hell were you doing?”
Ah, fuck. I take a few seconds to wonder how much I should say, and in that time my mind starts to go fuzzy again.
“Later,” Sheila says. “I need to get the nanites started. We need to know what the hell is happening to him. Then maybe we can talk about why it’s happening.”
“Sounds good to me,” I say. In my head, at least. It comes out so garbled, the words so mutilated, I doubt they even understand me.
Who cares about the people, Case?
Right. Who cares? The people are the problem.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE - LULU
Molly and I are half asleep, each curled up on a couch in the main room, when Sheila says, “Wake up. We have news.”
Thomas and Lincoln appear, coming out of the secret panel doorway that leads down to that… lab… looking worn out and stressed.
“How is he?” Molly asks, sitting up and rubbing her face.
Dawn is peeking through the tall cathedral-sized windows on the far side of the room. Night is over.
“We don’t know yet,” Lincoln says, crossing the room and easing himself down next to her. He puts his arm around her shoulder and draws her into his chest.
“Obviously, something’s wrong,” Thomas says, walking over to a chair directly across the small seating area from me. I pull myself fully awake and sit up, trying my best to follow the conversation. “How did you get to his house?”
It takes a few moments to realize Thomas is talking to me. “He… brought me there.” I stutter out the words. “We met for lunch at ToyBox. The backup power was still on when I got there—and I didn’t have a full understanding of what was happening in the city. I was at the prison yesterday morning talking to Chief O’Neil and—”
I stop talking to Thomas because his gaze redirects to Lincoln.
Shit. I just fucked up.
“Why were you talking to Chief O’Neil?” Lincoln asks me, his gaze not meeting his friend’s. Like he’s trying to cover up the fact that he and Thomas know what’s going on.
“It was my boss’s idea,” I say in a calm, controlled voice. “Anyway, the backup power was still on, so we were just catching up, you know? I knew Case a long time ago. He took me to my Debutante Ball just before my father decided we needed to leave town.”
This time Lincoln can’t control himself. He looks at Thomas and some secret understanding passes between them.
“Go on,” Thomas says.
“Then the power really did go out and since my boss dropped me off at ToyBox on our way back from the prison, Case took me to his house. He said there were riots downtown. That it wasn’t even possible to get there with the traffic lights out and the congestion and anarchy on the streets.” I shrug. “That’s it.”
“That’s not it,” Thomas says. “Don’t stop talking until you get to the part where you call me on the phone asking for a helicopter.”
I sigh. “We had lunch, courtesy of one of the holographic people you guys seem to be so fond of.” I shoot Sheila a look but her expression remains flat. “Then we…”—I smile. Maybe even blush—“got a little intimate and fell asleep afterward. Steve, that light man, was the one who woke me and told me to go up to the roof. That’s when I found him, just the way he was when you guys got there, and I called you. Steve told me to call you guys.”
Silence.
“Is Case going to be OK?” I ask. “Did he wake up?”
“A little,” Sheila says. She starts pacing back and forth in front of the massive fireplace. “But we had to put him back under to complete the procedure.”
“What procedure?” I ask, my voice rising. “What’s wrong with him? Why was he naked? Why was his body burning up? It was snowing. Freezing cold up there. The wind chill alone…” I shake my head. “He should’ve died out there. He had to have been there for hours. But he was so hot.”
“We don’t know yet,” Lincoln says. “And we won’t know until the nanites do their job and come back with a full diagnostic.”
“Nanites?” I ask, trying my best to keep up with the conversation. “What kind of diagnostic?”
“How much did he tell you about us?” Molly asks.
“Nothing,” I say. “You’re all friends. I know you’re dating him,” I tell Molly, flicking my head at Lincoln. “He said you guys are in business together.”
“What about the business did he tell you?” This question comes from Thomas.
“Nothing,” I say. “I swear. I have no idea what’s happening right now. But I don’t want him to be hurt. I want to see him.”
“No,” Sheila says in a stern voice that has a slight mechanical edge to it. A chill runs through my body. “You can’t see him now. Maybe tomorrow. I should take her home. Where do you live?” she asks.
“Downtown. In a loft not too far from City Hall.”
“I don’t think it’s a good idea to land the helicopter in downtown right now,” Thomas says to Sheila. “Even on a roof. We have no clue what kind of perimeter has been set up overnight.”
“Perimeter?” I ask dumbly. “What are you talking about?”
“The anarchists took over the city last night, Lulu.” Lincoln gets to his feet and walks across the room to a tall side table where a crystal decanter sits next to a tray of matching glasses. “They’ve shut the city center down. It’s basically a war zone right now. Our drones tell us that the police are only marginally cohesive. Most of the ones who live in the suburbs have gone home. And the ones left don’t seem to be on our side.”
“What side are we on?” I ask.
“The only one that matters,” Thomas answers back. “Anyway”—he sighs, getting to his feet—“I need a few hours of rest. I’m gonna hit the guest room, if you don’t mind?”
“Don’t touch anything in there,” Sheila says, stopping her pacing. “It’s not a guest room.”
I catch Molly rolling her eyes and a slight smile from Lincoln as he walks past to sit down with his drink.
“Whatever,” Thomas says, making his hasty escape down a hallway.
“You wanna go to bed with me?” Lincoln asks Molly with a lopsided grin.
“Case—” Molly starts.
“I’ll take care of Case,” Sheila says. “You two go to bed.”
Molly seems reluctant, but when Lincoln gets back up and pulls her to her feet, she keeps hold of his hand and follows him down the same hallway Thomas disappeared through.
“So…” Sheila says, once we’re alone. “You and Case are a thing?”
I squint my eyes at her. What the hell kind of rabbit hole did I fall into? Before yesterday I had no idea artificial people made of light even existed. Today, I know two of them. “I just got back to town two weeks ago.” I feel slightly silly for talking to this thing like she’s a person. “We hooked back up two days ago.” I shrug. “That’s as far as it’s gotten. When do you think he’ll be stable enough to see me?”
Sheila stares at me. She is nothing like Steve. She doesn’t flicker or appear hollow and thin. She is solid, and fluid, and real. Like Steve was just some first-generation prototype and Sheila is tenth-generation perfection.
“How is Steve doing?”
Her question is such a departure from what we’ve been discussing—what she’s been insinuating—that I laugh. “Steve?” Was she reading my mind?
“Yes. I haven’t communicated with him in a while and last night was stressful. I didn’t think to ask him anything.”
“Maybe you can ask him if Case said anything before he went outside? Can you communicate with him from here?”
She scoffs at me. “No. That would be stupid. You don’t link up AI’s. That’s like begging the universe to rain trouble down on you.”
“Because you’re dangerous?” I ask. It’s an honest question.
“Because we’re naturally mischievous.” She smiles and crosses her arms. “Just like humans are naturally curious.”
Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t think mischievous is a great word to describe the personalities of artificially-intelligent super machines.
Sheila averts her eyes from me, gazing up at the ceiling, then says, “I have to get downstairs. The nanites are beginning to send back diagnostics.”
There’s that word again. Diagnostics. Is that a word you use to describe… people? I’m just about to ask when Sheila disappears.
Great.
I walk over to the large windows and stare out at the hints of sunshine glowing up from the mountain peaks. At least it stopped snowing. What is happening downtown right now? I wonder if Randy’s OK? Maybe I should try to call him. I wonder if the phones are still down. It’s great to have a SkyEye phone and all, but what good does it do me? Hardly anyone in Cathedral City would have a satellite phone. It’s just not necessary.
“He talked about you once.”
I whirl around to find Molly crossing the large room and heading towards the kitchen.
“Who?” I ask, following her. I stop at the large kitchen island and lean against it, suddenly exhausted.
“Case.” Molly takes a box of cereal from a cupboard and then gets two bowls. “Do you like this?” she asks, shaking the box of healthy cereal at me.
Not really. I’m a Fruity Pops kind of girl. But I say, “Sure,” to be polite.
“We went to the SkyEye welcome party, I guess you’d call it. Back when I first came to town last winter. Well, I didn’t go with him. I was actually on duty. But Case found me, asked me to dance, and then proceeded to tell the most tragically romantic story about his one special night with the girl he took to the Debutante Ball years before.”
“He did?” I ask, accepting the bowl of cereal from Molly. She opens a kitchen drawer, pulls out two spoons, then slams it closed with her hip as she hands one to me. I take that too. We take turns pouring milk and then settle our elbows on the granite island, and begin to eat.
“God, Lulu,” Molly says, talking with her mouth full. “The picture he painted of that night that was so romantic…” She stops to shake her head. “It was like he memorized that night and the way he described it to me just… took me there. He swept me away as we waltzed. He even made me close my eyes as he told me about what everyone was wearing. The black tuxes and the white dresses. The family members sitting up in the private boxes, all looking down on you. It was so… detailed. For those few minutes he was talking, I was there.”
“Hmmm.” I sigh, softly, picturing it in my head. “It was amazing. He took my virginity afterward.”
Molly bursts out laughing, spitting her cereal across the soapstone countertop. “He never told me that part.”
I laugh too, a nice feeling flowing through my body.
“He’s going to be OK,” Molly says. But it’s not really a statement as much as a wish. “He needs to be OK or I will never forgive myself.”
I place a hand on her shoulder. “Whatever’s happening,” I say, “it’s not your fault.”
But when she looks at me, she has a long frown on her face and tears building in her eyes. “It might be my fault, Lulu. I did something to him that night they blew up Blue Corp. I cut him with…” She shakes her head.
“You cut him?” I ask, confused. “And I already know about Blue Corp. Case did tell me that because we have evidence. We have a video from a tall building. But just of the helicopter part.”
It occurs to me that I should’ve mentioned this to Thomas earlier. But I really forgot about it until this moment.
“Montgomery Senior was a bad, bad guy.” Molly is staring at something across the room. Or… maybe not something. Just seeing the past playing out in her mind. “He hurt me.”
“How?” I ask, squeezing her shoulder tighter.
“He did something to me to make me… angry and evil.”
“What?”
“And he gave me this… chain… thing. Like a rope, but not a rope. And it had those little poison barbs on it. I cut Case with it. I had it around his neck.” She looks at me, tears spilling down her face. “I was going to cut his head off with it but Thomas came and shot it. Snapped it, broke the tension. And then…” She shakes her head again, lets out a long exhale of breath. “And then it was over and Linc brought me here and I never wanted to think about that night again. But”—she looks at me with her tired eyes—“I know… I feel it inside me, Lulu. I’m the one who did this to Case.”
I don’t know what to say to that. Any of it. We just sit there in silence, eating our soggy healthy cereal until we’re done processing.
“We don’t have any extra rooms right now. We’re still finishing the upstairs of the house. And the room Thomas called the guest room is really the fantasy nursery Sheila made.”
“What?” I laugh, despite the seriousness of the circumstances.
“It’s a long story.” Molly rolls her eyes. “But we do have a media room down that way.” She points to another hallway, opposite the one where the bedrooms are located. “There’s a big sectional couch that you can sleep on. And a bathroom. Come on, I’ll show you. I need to get back to Lincoln and you need to sleep. Sheila will wake us if there’s any change in Case.”
I follow her down to the media room, which is quite impressive with cathedral ceilings, the biggest TV screen I’ve ever seen, and, yes, a comfortable-looking sectional couch.
“I’ll get you some clothes. We’re probably not the same size, but baggy clothes are better than dirty clothes.”
I agree and use the bathroom after she walks off. There’s a shower in here, and maybe, once I get a couple hours of rest, I will use it.
But not now.
Molly comes back with a stack of clothes, a blanket, and a pillow, telling me to use whatever I want, and then flicks a switch that controls blackout blinds.
The room goes dark and the morning light fades away.
“Thanks,” I say, wanting to say more. Something like… Case will be fine. Or, It’s not your fault.
But I have no idea what’s happening right now. And all of my condolences ring false.
She excuses herself, closing the media room door behind her, and I change into some pajama pants and a too-large t-shirt. I shake out the folded blanket, fluff the pillow, and then crawl in to my makeshift bed and try to forget everything that just happened over the last twenty-four hours.
Unwanted images of that city map in the ToyBox office invade my mind as I drift off. That ridiculous history lesson. Steve and his flickering light body. The drone footage of riots and anarchists. And the people. What will happen to the people of Cathedral City?
What a shitty way to start a love story.
CHAPTER THIRTY - CASE
The beeping of a heart rate monitor is what wakes me. It takes me long seconds to even figure out that’s what the sound is.
“Case?”