by Simon Curtis
Everyone is dazed, confused, trying to piece together what just took place. Several survivors begin to scream and cry, but I can’t even move, paralyzed in horror at what I’ve done.
No. I couldn’t have done this. This isn’t possible.
“Isaak!”
A voice cries for me on the other side of the mound of bodies.
“Isaak!”
She cries out again, and a face pops up above the mound. It’s Kamea.
“Isaak, you have to come with me. Now.”
I take her hand and climb over the heap. Nausea churns in my stomach as I step over the corpses I assembled in a pile in order to save my own life. I am disgusted with myself. Everything is silent in my head, lost completely in my own despair, as Kamea rushes me toward the elevator.
As the doors close on us, I see Azure and Aleister step into the hall, fully clothed. Azure catches a glimpse of us, and just before the doors seal, I see her eyes go wide as she starts to run toward us.
As soon as the elevator opens onto the basement floor, Kamea runs with me toward the door to the left and rapidly sets the code in the lock. The door slides back and she races with me down the hall of secret projects. She punches in the next code and runs toward the control panels along the wall. Machines buzz and come to life as she nervously, frantically, steals glances back over her shoulder toward the door.
The hatch opens on the egglike Gate, and Kamea takes my hand.
“I need you to trust me, Isaak. Please trust me.”
Her deep, brown eyes bear into me with a passion and ferocity I have never seen from anyone. Her spirit is wild and so full of life, and for the first time I notice something inexplicable. Standing before her, staring into her eyes, makes me feel the same way I felt standing at the top of Blackburn Park, looking out over Pacific in the early-morning light. It’s like standing at the edge of the ocean.
A furious pounding at the door disrupts our gaze. I nod to her and she grasps my wrist and runs me over toward the egg.
“Just like we did last night. Both hands on the obelisk. This time, don’t let go.”
She’s sending me away.
There’s another furious pounding at the door, followed by muffled shouts.
Kamea takes me in her arms and hugs me, squeezing so hard I feel the breath expel from her lungs.
She knew.
She already knew what I was, what I could do, when she brought me here last night. She knew what the others were so afraid of, what I was so afraid of, and kept it from me. She showed me how to operate the machine and waited right until the very end—just before it dismantled me—to tell me to stop.
Please trust me.
Her words echo in my head as the sound of a powerful blast hitting the door fills the room.
I have no choice but to trust her.
She pulls back and looks into my eyes once more. “I’ll see you when you wake up.”
I step into the pod and place both of my hands upon the black obelisk as the hatch lowers and seals behind me. A tingling sensation rises up through my fingertips and flows through my arms into the very center of my being. I let the tendrils of my connection to the other Robots gently prod out around me and, within seconds the tingling turns into a fire. I hold the obelisk tight and let go of everything—my body, my mind, my fear—and let the fire consume me.
Everything I have ever been or ever known burns away completely, and in a flash I cease to exist.
• • •
In death I find a quiet, all-encompassing solace that negates everything I once considered important, everything I used to value, used to be. Everything simply is. There is no pain, no wrongdoing, no judgment, only energy, flowing in and out of everything, all at once. My concept of time has been nothing more than illusion my whole life, and now, here in the void, I finally comprehend it.
At least I think I do.
The darkness envelopes me, but it doesn’t frighten me. If anything, it is a comfort. I am fully a part of it all now—the nothingness, the everything. It just is.
A light appears on the horizon. Curious, I race toward it. I flow without fear or friction to the blooming glow. The light accepts me as I approach and absorbs me entirely. I leave the darkness as one leaves his true love—knowing, in the deepest part of his being, that they both shall meet again.
And then I wake up.
My eyes slowly open. I am naked, under a white sheet, in a white bed, in a sterile, white room. I can barely move. My body aches with a pain so deep it feels like it emanates from the center of my bones. Every nerve ending in my body is lit up, sensitive to every single touch and sound as though it might break me.
I lean my head to the left and see a series of machines connected to wires leading to small pads attached to my chest. I feel the machine operating as a phantom limb of my own body—checking me, scanning my vital signs, ensuring that I am still alive. I deactivate the machine with my thoughts and dim the lights in the room.
Within seconds I hear footsteps racing toward the door. It swings open and a man bursts in. He is somewhat short, with light brown skin and a head of thick, gray hair, cropped short. He wears glasses over his brown eyes and looks at me with what appears to be wonder.
He steps toward me, and I shake my head as much as I can. I don’t want him to approach. I don’t even know where I am.
“Where am I?”
My voice is raspy and weak. My own vocal chords feel foreign.
The man looks speechless. He glances at the machine to my left, powered down, then looks me up and down.
“You are somewhere quite safe, I assure you.”
Safe.
The word means nothing to me anymore.
“Who are you?”
The man hesitates, then takes a step toward me. “My name is Dr. Mayur Asim.”
Panic surges through me as I try to scramble out of the bed. My body refuses to comply, and I am barely able to shift more than a few inches.
“Please, please calm down.”
Asim raises his hands in a peaceful gesture and moves toward me, but I refuse to let him come near me. This is the man responsible for our genocide. The terrorist attempting to use us in order to gain power. I don’t know how I wound up here, but I will not let this man capture me and use me as a pawn. Gone are the days when I let others choose my path for me. I have power now, and I will use it if necessary.
I scramble for the energy inside me, but just before I find it, the door swings open once again, and Kamea walks in.
The energy dissipates before it arrives as she stands before me stunned, relieved.
“Isaak.”
Nothing makes sense. Nothing feels right. The pain in my body flares up and my muscles go limp from exhaustion.
“What are you doing here?” My mouth feels so dry as I wheeze out the words.
“You’re safe. Everything is fine. I promise I will explain everything, but for now you need to rest.”
“I don’t understand.”
I glance at Asim, standing sheepishly at the side of the bed.
Kamea sighs and takes a moment before she looks into my eyes. “Isaak, this is my father.”
The room swirls out of focus, and blackness creeps around the edges of my vision as her words play over and over in my head.
• • •
The next day, when I am finally able to stand, I take my first steps down the hallway beyond the door and try to gauge my surroundings. I appear to be in a laboratory. There are no windows, only fluorescent lights, computers, and desks cluttered with equipment. I stagger toward a flight of stairs, but Kamea runs down and intercepts me before I can make it up.
“You’re up,” she says as she gently wraps my arm around her shoulder for support. “Let me show you the house.”
Slowly, she guides me up the steps and gives me a tour.
• • •
A few hours later we eat lunch at a large table in a dining room surrounded by glass. The house sits in the middle of
what looks like a jungle—an endless, dense wall of green encloses us, hiding us from the outside world. A midday rainstorm pours down outside, and candles light the table as we eat. The food is incredible. My tongue revels in the sensations as though it’s the first time it has ever tasted anything at all. Fruit and vegetables, all grown on the property, spiced with curry and cumin, served over rice. It all hits my system and nourishes me in a way I’ve never appreciated before.
“I can only assume you have many questions, Isaak,” Asim says, breaking the silence as I clean my plate.
I put my fork down and give him my full attention.
“What you must know, first and foremost, is that I am not your enemy. Please know that.”
A deep roll of thunder rumbles overhead.
“Any rumors of me being a terrorist, some mastermind bent on using synthetic humans to achieve some sort of goal, are merely that: rumors. Planted by the SHRF, I assure you. They would not have their enemies discover common allies at any cost.”
I glance to Kamea, who stares ahead in silence.
“I began work on the project that eventually led to the creation of synthetic human life many years ago, after my beloved wife, Kamea’s mother, was diagnosed with cancer. I believed, foolheartedly, that I, above all other men, could find a cure. I accepted it as my destiny and sacrificed everything in order to achieve it. After my wife passed away, I met a woman who held the key to finally unlocking the door to my goal. A woman named Evelyn Adamson. Evelyn was one of the premier experts in nanorobotics at the time, and together we hypothesized that the answer to the riddle of curing the human cell lay not within the human cell itself, but in a new, healthy, synthetic version, capable of replacing it. Capable of functioning and replicating of its own accord, exactly as a healthy human cell should. But as we stood on the edge of our breakthrough, we were acquired by the United States government, with the promise of a blank check with which to fund ourselves and unbridled resources to continue our research. We were deceived.”
A flash of lighting lights up the room, followed by another low rumble of thunder.
“The government had no interest in curing cancer, and very quickly we realized exactly where their true intentions lay. But it was too late. We were too far along. They had everything they needed to continue on without us, even if we were to pull out or attempt to halt the project. They used us to create the world’s deadliest weapon, and we had succeeded.”
A moment of silence passes over the room.
“The original team, including Evelyn and myself, began meeting in secret. Evelyn had already begun working on a plan to ensure that the project never came to fruition, because for all of the danger of a country wielding synthetic, impervious supersoldiers, there was another even greater doom lurking in the shadows that our superiors refused to acknowledge. What you may not know, Isaak, is that the cells in your body were initially created from those of an organic human. The technology that Evelyn and I developed, called the Master Cell, was meant to be capable of producing healthy, synthetic blood cells, capable of healing a human’s diseased or dysfunctional ones. Master Cells, as they were designed, take control of a human’s cell production, producing only synthetic cells henceforth, designed to help the body in which they were introduced. The government took it a step further however. They wanted synthetic life. They altered the Master Cells so that instead of targeting red and white blood cells, they took control of the germ cell production. When synthetic sperm fertilizes an organic egg, a being composed entirely of synthetic cells is born. The baby grows and appears to be a normal, albeit peculiarly healthy child, until the eve of his eighteenth birthday. Like clockwork, after eighteen years, the cells inside the body fully manifest and activate to their full potential. This is when the government would have their coveted weapon: an army of synthetic soldiers, capable of feats of strength and wielding powers no human had ever dreamed of. What they didn’t initially realize, though, was that what we had created behaved more like a parasite than a cure. Once the newly designed Master Cells took hold of the human host’s germ cell production, the human would never again be able to produce an organic human child. In order to ensure efficiency, the government created the Master Cells to behave in a way that appeared almost ruthless in order to maximize their potential. Once the Master Cells take hold, organic men are controlled by an insatiable urge to breed, but because of the complexity of the egg itself, organic women are rendered sterile. Ultimately, the government had hurtled toward creating a synthetic cell capable of multiplying at a rapid rate, while simultaneously choking out our ability to replicate organically.”
I stare openly at him while his words sink in. I can’t believe what I’m hearing. The muscles in my forehead tense as I try to find the right questions to ask.
Kamea takes a deep breath and looks at me.
“Isaak, the technology used to create the Robots isn’t just a weapon. It’s a virus. The deadliest virus humanity has ever faced. And if we don’t do something to stop it, humankind as we know it will be completely wiped out in only a few years.”
My heart stops. Everything grinds to a halt as the reality of my very existence begins to finally appear clearly before me.
“There are only a handful of people left on Earth who stand a chance of stopping this from happening, and you’re looking at one of them,” Kamea says as she gestures to her father. “He might be the last one left, for all we know.”
I rest my hands on the table and take several deep breaths. I look to Asim, then to Kamea. Her eyes are welled with tears. She reaches a hand out toward me and, gratefully, I take it.
“What do we do?”
“Fortunately, Isaak,” Asim says, “I think you could be the key to everything.”
• • •
I sit on the cliff and breathe deeply as the ocean crashes against the black rock below. The sky is a brilliant shade of rose gold, and the water below stretches out toward the horizon like an endless plane of blackish blue nothing. I close my eyes and try to breathe in some sort of comfort.
Kamea takes my hand and I open my eyes. She offers me a faint smile and then turns to watch the sunset. I look out as well and wonder how many of these I will be able to appreciate in my life. How many moments I’ll be able to sit like this and simply be grateful that I was ever able to live in the first place.
Tomorrow we will leave this place, this hidden corner of the world, and set out to make so many wrongs right before it’s all too late and no one is left alive to watch the sun set at all.
We have to get back to the others. We have to reveal to them what I now know, and unite, as a single force, to prevent catastrophe. Then we need to find her. Evelyn. She’s out there somewhere and has the final piece to the giant puzzle I’m now a part of. Although Asim has no idea where she might be, he did receive one piece of communication from her during his years in hiding. A message that appeared on the screen of his computer, down in his lab.
It is functional. Find me when it is time. —Samus
The message ended with an image: a graphic of a small, red, 8-bit heart.
THE TRAITOR
She sat in the dark and checked once again that no one was behind her. He’d finally gone to bed. She thought he’d never go to sleep. Now everything was quiet, and she was sure she could make the call. She took the phone from her pocket and typed in the sequence of numbers. The momentary hold while she was patched through only seemed to amplify the silence. Her pulse quickened, as it always did when she spoke to him, and then a crackle sounded in her ear as the phone picked up on the other end.
“I’ve heard interesting reports.”
“The invasion was a success. He’s fully operational.”
“And he’s doing what needs to be done?”
“Don’t worry. I have him completely under control. He will perform exactly as planned.”
“Perfect.”
“How is she?”
But before she received an answer, the line went d
ead.
She sat in the dark and wondered how she’d gotten here—lurking in the shadows, betraying everything and everyone she had ever known, plotting genocide.
She stepped back into the hallway and headed to her room, hoping she could sleep it all away.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
There are no words fit to describe the feeling of sitting down to write the acknowledgments for my very first novel. It is one of the biggest, most elusive dreams I’ve ever dreamed, and to think that it somehow came true is still incredibly surreal at times. In reality, dreams don’t come to fruition on their own, and I’m thrilled to have the opportunity to thank those who’ve helped me bring this one to life.
First and foremost, I need to thank my parents, Monica and Carroll. I know that neither of you knew what to make of a child who wrote poems, refused to play outside in order to read as many books as possible, and physically needed to sing and dance in order to survive. You taught me what it means to be strong and showed me what true fortitude was when I faced cancer. You didn’t understand me when you learned I was gay, but you both had the strength to seek forgiveness and to pursue the understanding that initially eluded you. I couldn’t be more proud of how far our relationship has come, and cannot thank you enough for encouraging me in every single thing I’ve ever told you I was capable of doing.
To J. K. Rowling, for making me want to do this.
To Michael Scott, for telling me that I needed to do this.
To Alex London, for showing me that I could.
To Ernest Cline, for being so kind, warm, and thoughtful. You took the time to support me with a blurb when no one else would, and of everyone I asked, you could’ve easily been the one to laugh at me and simply say no. Thank you.
To Britney Spears, for existing.
To Laurie McLean, your enthusiasm, tenacity, and eagerness to say “YES! LET’S TAKE OVER THE WORLD!” to me whenever I need to hear it are so invaluable to me. I am lucky to have you as my agent.