by Ethan Cooper
I don’t remember ever being here before, I really don’t. And yet, there’s something about this place that makes me think I have been. If I lived in this city at all, I don’t see how I could have avoided it.
“What is it?” JACK asks, stopping abruptly so that I run into her.
“Sorry,” I mutter. “It’s just this place. It’s a lot to take. It’s loud. It’s bright. I have a headache.”
“We won’t stay any longer than we have to.”
She takes my hand. I follow her into the shadow of the circus. I can’t help myself; I look up, stunned into quiet wonder at the size and spectacle of this place.
It’s impossible to describe the fluid chaos here underneath the great dome above. We wander a tangled web of paths that run between buildings and tents and other structures. Everything’s moving. Everything’s flashing. Everything’s brightly colored. Everything’s loud.
I’m having trouble breathing.
I shouldn’t be here.
It’s like being locked in a room filled with people having an orgy, and you’re the only one not participating. You can’t escape, and there isn’t any direction you can turn to and actually look away.
I’m trapped. An unwilling voyeur, I try to close my eyes, but it’s as if the circus won’t let me. The best I can do is force my eyelids to remain down longer when I blink, but when they wink back open, the images I see are things I’ll never forget.
BLINK.
Two humanoid robots are juggling. They remove their limbs one at a time, tossing them between each other, then reattaching them.
BLINK.
A trio of teenage girls, sitting in a circle, cross-legged and holding hands, bow their heads so that their foreheads almost touch in the center. Each has a thin, translucent cable running from the base of their skull to the girl beside her. Their slack faces are partially obscured by hanging hair. A young male emerges from the crowd and runs his hands through their hair. The girls don’t react, so his hands move lower.
BLINK.
Three men in white coats strap a gray-haired man into an oversized, metal chair. A mechanical arm descends from above, lowering a new implant into his left eye socket.
BLINK.
A four-poster bed, draped with wispy, fluttering veils of cream and crimson and set with sheets and pillows of silvery black. Three robots are entangled. Thrusting pneumatic pistons hiss, singing along with the low groan of sockets and plugs mating. The whine of motors cycling and the whir of cogs spinning is punctuated by the clank of metal on metal and the occasional hiss of venting lubricating fluids.
BLINK.
On a small, circular stage stands a naked wirewitch. Her skin is pale, and two of her three hairstalks have been chopped off. The faint glow of pulse shielding surrounds the stage. The crowd stares at her, their mouths gaping. Somebody in the crowd curses and throws something. It disintegrates against the shield.
BLINK.
“Monsters,” I whisper.
“She’s not a real wirewitch,” JACK says.
“How do you know?”
She doesn’t answer.
We continue deeper into the circus. I’m not sure who or what JACK is looking for exactly, but there’s nothing to do but follow her lead.
Inside the circus, lights fed by an unknown power source that somehow survived the fall, I struggle to find evidence that Cyberspace is offline. Or maybe I just don’t know what symptoms I should be looking for. Everything’s lit and glowy, everything’s moving. People look happier in here.
“Should we have helped her?” I ask, not sure if I was asking JACK or myself.
“The witch? She didn’t need help. I told you she wasn’t real. It’s a circus, Syl. Everything here is designed to get your attention and your money.”
“I don’t have any money.”
JACK looks over her shoulder at me, her eyes flicking from my head to my feet, then back up again in a way that no thirteen year-old should ever look at me. Even shrouded by my cloak, I feel like I’m not wearing anything. “I know,” she says. “It’s unfortunate actually, because if they can’t take your money, then they’ll just want something else. But we’ve already talked about how much you’re worth.”
“Do different wirewitch covens interact with each other?”
“I’m sure it happens. Mostly, my coven avoided contact with others. I’ve seen plenty of other wirewitches, but for the most part I was kept at a distance. Since I was the youngest, they protected me.” There’s a faint, disquieting buzz in JACK’s voice as she talks about her coven.
“So, what if she really was a wirewitch then?”
There’s a pause, but she holds my gaze the entire time. “You’re my priority. I told you I’d protect you, and that’s what I’m going to do. We’re not here to save anybody else. We’re not here to save the world. We’re here to find out who you are, and to do that we need to stay out of trouble. We’re here to survive. Glitch anybody who gets in our way.”
I can’t stop myself. I lean down, pull her into my arms, and hug her.
Her arms have just begun their trek around my waist when I hear a whisper in my ear: “Hey, Blue!”
Releasing JACK, swiveling my head, only to see that there’s nobody behind me, at least not close enough to have whispered in my ear. Anyway, their voice was so clear and close, the person would have had to have been sharing the hood of my cloak with me. “Who said that?” I ask. A couple people look at me. Dumb to call attention to myself like that.
“Over here, Blue!”
Again, right in my ear—a deep, modulated voice, but mixed with the faint whisper of tinkling bells. I turn, and…of course there’s nobody there.
“What is it?” JACK asks, taking a step so she’s closer to me.
“Somebody’s trying to get my attention. They’re whispering in my ear. How are they doing that?”
“Is it a man or a woman or something else?”
“It’s a…man I think.”
JACK grabs my hand. “We’re leaving.”
I let her turn me, but it’s too late, because I know right away that it’s him—the man behind the whisper in my ear—standing only a few paces in front of us.
JACK utters what I can only assume is a curse word.
The man—if that’s what he truly is underneath all that—faces us, legs apart and knees locked. He’s tall, at least a head taller than I am. He looks like he’s either wearing full body armor, or he’s made entirely of metal. It’s difficult to tell which, but if it’s body armor, it fits him like my skinsuit does me: like it’s my epidermis. The material is smooth, but broken by seams that define his muscles and bone structure. The metal is not black, but it’s well on its way there. Unlike just about everything else in this place, his body isn’t polished and gleaming—it’s scuffed and dull. Littering the smooth, matte surface of his armor are spikes and blades, all of differing sizes and placed seemingly at random. Weaving through the forest of sharp protrusions are pinpricks of red light, each connected by thin pulsing lines that create flowing designs across his body. The red light pulses as he breathes. He doesn’t appear to be wearing any clothes, but there’s nothing dangling free between his legs, so maybe it is body armor. Or maybe he’s an android. His face is a mask of dark metal. If he’s human, it’s a little difficult to determine his age, but my mind tells me that there’s the face of an older man underneath that mask. He’s certainly nowhere near as young as I am. I could probably be more accurate if I could see his eyes, but the mask has those hidden behind red-tinted domes. Though the mask flows over the ridge of his nose, it’s smooth below that, with no holes for his mouth. Instead, he’s painted on a mouth with white, shining teeth. The mouth is a caricature—too wide, and grinning like a cartoon character might. It’s the smile of a clown in its natural habitat. He doesn’t have any hair, but on his head rests a gleaming chrome crown featuring spikes that rise up at least half a meter above his head. The metal man has his arm stretched out to us, his hand
beckoning us to come closer.
The crowd parts around him, as if they don’t know he’s there, but want to avoid him anyway.
“Okay, what the hell is that?” I ask.
JACK puts a hand on my shoulder and moves me backward. “That is unfriendly and dangerous.”
dangerous don’t you mean
(deadly)
The man’s voice is in my ear again: “No! No! No! Come over here to me! Don’t let the youngling guide you away! I know you, and I have secrets! Come over here and see!”
I plant my feet, pulling JACK up short. “Wait. He wants to tell me something. I think we—”
JACK’s head is shaking before I can even finish. “Bad idea. Trust me.”
“The youngling is wrong! Coming over here and seeing is a good idea!”
The man must’ve been talking into JACK’s ear that time too, because she abruptly jerks her head toward him. She’s making some sound that’s sort of like a hiss, only I can feel it vibrating through the hand she has on my shoulder.
I put a hand on hers. It’s easier than ever to allow myself to touch her now. “He says he knows me.”
JACK shakes her head. “Look at him. Even I don’t know what he is! I mean, how glitched up do we have to be in order for us to believe we’ve already found somebody that knows you? It’s never that easy—these things take time. No, this is too convenient to be true. It’s a trap. He just wants to eat us, or worse.”
I’m really starting to love being lectured by somebody who barely looks old enough to be a teenager. This is such a strange world I’ve woken to. Then again, if I’m correct about my age, I’m only a few years older than she is.
“There’s something worse than being eaten?” I ask.
JACK sighs, tilting her head as if she’s trying to figure out what foreign language I’m speaking.
I shrug her hand off. “Maybe it’s a trap. Maybe not. Either way, I have to find out. Are you with me?”
“I’m with you of course,” she says in a tone of voice that I can imagine myself using if people never listened to me. “Don’t get us killed.”
I sure can’t wait to have a kid of my own.
The metal man turns, walking through the crowd like he’s the only one on the path. Everybody avoids him, but I’m not sure if it’s because they can see him, or if he’s doing something that just makes them move aside. He’s moving at a quick pace, forcing me to jog to keep up. JACK’s behind me. Not sure how I feel about being the tip of the spear.
BLINK.
The sign above the bright-orange tent reads: WANT TO DIE TODAY? WE CAN HELP! From inside comes a high-pitched, mechanical whine and an ululating scream.
BLINK.
A table lined with rows of biomechanical implants—enhanced optics, pain suppressors, adrenaline injectors, personal shields, EMP emitters, poison glands, stealth field generators, photon redirectors, and other enhancements. The vendor gestures toward her wares, hand twitching uncontrollably. Several of the implants glisten, red and wet like slabs of meat cut fresh from a slaughtered animal.
BLINK.
Didn’t notice at first, but as the metal man turns, leading us off to one side and between two competing flesh vendors, I can see that there’s something wrong with the way he walks. When he steps with his left foot, there’s a brief hitch in his gait, as if he’s compensating for something. The metal man has a limp.
okay so what that’s not
(important)
JACK’s hand is on my shoulder, insistent. “No! We’re not going in there.”
My mouth is opening to protest, then I realize what she’s talking about. The walls of the two vendors on either side of the path form a narrow alley that, after twenty meters or so, ends at the edge of the dome.
The metal man doesn’t stop until he’s all the way at the end of the alley. He pivots on one foot, spinning all the way around several times, ending up facing us. And there, he waits. He’s not moving or motioning for us to follow. He’s just standing there, a dark clown in a dim alley in a bright circus.
JACK blocks my way, her stance and expression just about daring me to push past her. I’m not stupid enough to think I’m capable of doing that. Besides, she’s probably right. Don’t have a lot of options though, so we’re going in there to find out what this metal clown wants to tell me.
“We’re going in there,” I say. “Well, I am at least.”
“Think about it. Why does he want us to go all the way back there with him? If he had something to say, he could do it out here. But no, he’s leading us back there so he can harvest our organs without being interrupted.”
“That’s where you come in. We’re not exactly defenseless.”
“Yeah, but he’s big, and he’s armored, and we don’t have any idea what he’s capable of.”
“We have to take the chance.”
“It’s too risky. He’s been following us. You know that, right? If he knows something about you, it’s not likely that he just happened to find us here. Have him come out here, where we have a better chance of escape if he wants to do more than just talk.”
“Hey, Blue, are you going to let your little sister boss you around like that? Don’t be afraid. I won’t bite. Really, I can’t. Didn’t you notice that my mouth is just painted on? Do you like it? I did it myself!”
A quick look at JACK reveals that yes, she heard that too. The sigh on her face escapes through her teeth like air from a deflating balloon. “We shouldn’t trust him.”
“I know,” I say, sidestepping her. As we advance down the alley, she moves in beside me, her shoulder brushing mine. There’s a lot of comfort in that brief contact.
The metal man, with his ridiculous crown and his scrawled-by-a-child grin, actually claps as we approach, the clanking of his hands together an unsettling noise in my ears.
“Okay, we’re here,” I say, crossing my arms. “Now tell me just who the fuck you are, and why you’ve been following us. What do you want?” I say. That was supposed to sound tough, but it didn’t. I mean, it really didn’t.
“Whoa, don’t hurt me,” the metal man says, holding up his hands, palms toward us.
As if I could hurt him.
As if I am a threat to anybody.
He cocks his head to one side, appearing to study us. “Is that how you talk to every stranger you meet?”
Not all of them. Sometimes, instead of being rude to people, I wander around without clothes on and fall on top of them. “I don’t know you, that’s all.”
(it’s so much more than)
(that)
(isn’t it)
He crosses his arms. I’m pretty sure he’s copying my stance. “Is that how your parents taught you to talk?”
I can still hear faint bells jingling in my ears, but his voice—a low, digitally processed thing—is much clearer now that it’s coming directly from his person.
“What do you know about my parents?” I ask.
“You answer questions with questions!” He shakes his head, his crown sliding around on his head but somehow never falling off. “Oh, but I’m not here to answer your questions, little one. No, I’ve got secrets to tell, oh so many secrets! Come closer and let me tell them to you!”
JACK steps in front of me, holding me back with one hand on my stomach. “No.”
“You’re very wise to have a bodyguard with you, Blue,” he says, “but unwise to have chosen a wirewitch. And a youngling! Look how she’s pretending to protect you! So brave! So fierce! She’s so cosmically cute! Where did you find her?”
“She asked you a question,” JACK says.
He wags both of his index fingers at her. “Actually, she’s asked me several questions, little one, and I know the answers to all of them. Oh, yes I do! But she didn’t ask very nicely, so I’m deciding whether I’m going to answer any of them.”
“That’s it,” JACK says, grabbing my elbow. “We’re leaving.”
“My name is…Calamity Carl.”
JACK blows air out between clenched teeth, her hairstalks jerking beneath her cloak. “Is that supposed to be two first names?”
“Oh, I like her!” Calamity Carl says, turning to me. “She’s dangerous and disrespectful! In our world, those are two qualities that are guaranteed to either keep you alive or get you killed! Which of those two do you think it’s going to be with her?”
“It could go either way,” I snap. “If you have something to tell us, get on with it. I was starting to like wandering around aimlessly, so I’d like to get back to it as soon as possible.”
“Hey—” JACK begins.
“Let it go,” I say. “I’m just trying to get this over with.”
Calamity Carl adjusts the crown on his head several times until it’s perfectly askew. He widens his stance and puts his hands on his hips. “Get this over with? Oh no, that’s not the way you and I are going to work. Let me assure you, my blue-haired angel, this isn’t so easily got over. You see, this is only the beginning where you and I are concerned. I know where you came from, and I know where you’re going. You have a purpose, and I’ve been sent here to guide you toward it.”
“Nobody is guiding me anywhere,” I say, unable to describe what it did to me when I heard him call me that. Blue-haired…
(angel)
“Syl…” JACK says. There’s a warning in her voice, but I’m not sure why.
“I’m here to tell you that Devilgod has a plan for your life,” Calamity Carl says.
“Who the fuck is Devilgod?” I spit.
“Devilgod? Oh, he’s the one who sent me to you. As for who he is—you’ll meet him eventually, and he’ll tell you himself. But he’s not important right now. What is important right now is you, and me, and what I have to tell you.”
“Just tell me,” I say through gritted teeth. He called me blue-haired angel.
“Come closer then, little one. I have five secrets to tell you today, and I want you closer this first time.”