The Harmony Paradox

by Matthew S. Cox

  Something’s wrong. I never should’ve brought her out here. “I know something’s eating at you. Not gonna force anything, but you can tell me anything. I mean that.” He smiled.

  Cielo shot past him and bounded into the truck, cheering. Kathy stalked after him, carrying his shirt and shaking her head. Luna emerged, still nursing her water bottle as she walked over.

  “Thanks,” whispered Hayley, returning her gaze to her lap.

  Halcón and Gato tossed the sleeping bags in the back, with help from Eldon.

  Kenny pulled himself up into the driver’s seat. He stared out at the road, one arm draped over the wheel while waiting for everyone to get in. Eventually, with everyone accounted for, he pushed the starter button for the biodiesel.

  Nothing happened.

  Fuck… come on. He let his finger off the button, clenched his jaw, and jammed it down again.

  Dead.

  “Minor problem.” Kenny reached around behind the starter button enclosure, feeling for the contacts.

  Eldon stared at him with a grim face. “You gotta be shittin’ me.”

  “It’s been awhile since I used this. The battery might be gone.” Kenny grabbed a coil of wire from the glovebox, snapped two pieces off, and wound them onto the contact poles. “Remind me to rewire this damn thing with an e-mag port if I decide to come back out here.”

  “If you connect an e-mag directly to those leads, you will melt the system.” Nasir reached into the front seat. “I have a standard voltage output on the board. Let me see the wires.”

  Kenny added more wire from the spool to make his splice longer, and passed the leads to Nasir, who inserted them into a port on the top edge of the bot control board. Sparks snapped at the second wire, and the truck roared to life.

  A collective sigh of relief filled the cabin.

  “I get food bags,” said Gato.

  Kenny accelerated gently as the boy crawled out the window to the truck bed. Operating on diesel, the air conditioning wouldn’t run, so all four windows wound up open. Gato tossed food packets in one by one, calling names as he did so. His bushy, wild hair whipped behind him as he held the last packet over his head in both hands and yelled his own name.

  “Get in before you fall,” yelled Kathy over the sound of the engine and the buzz of the tires on pavement.

  Gato clambered back inside, and Kathy slid the window closed. The smell of dust and mixed food filled the cabin in minutes. The Navcon predicted their arrival at the West City wall in fourteen hours. It’s gonna be dark before we get there… fuck it. I ain’t stoppin’. With any luck, the rumored deadly aftereffects of the ‘PFS’ ration wouldn’t manifest. As he emptied each packet of his breakfast meal, Kenny tucked them with care back into the main pouch.

  Eldon laughed. “Man that’s funny. You’re collecting the empty ration packs despite us driving past ruined houses, derelict cars, and all manner of junk.”

  “It’s respect for the land. All that stuff is part of the land now. This”―he patted the plastic―”isn’t.”

  Once again, Alyssa lost herself in her NetMini. Hayley seemed on edge, and kept prairie-dogging at the windows, perking up to peer in all directions. That got Kenny doing it too. What if Eldon’s right and she is psionic? Bah, psionic doesn’t mean she sees the future.

  Hayley jumped and screamed when a huge insect splattered on the windshield, leaving a smear two feet across of opaque yellow-white. When Halcón called them delicious roasted over a fire, she nearly sprayed her breakfast.

  A touch over three hours later, enough small voices complained about needing to go that he pulled over. After a short stop to give everyone a chance to walk around, stretch, and enjoy some fresh air, they piled back in the truck and continued.

  Every few minutes, Kenny glanced at the Navcon display. He chided himself whenever he did at the disappointment of so little time passing. Another fifty-eight minutes of driving west later, the diesel engine sputtered and went silent.

  Shit.

  “What happened?” asked Hayley, a nervous tremor in her voice.

  “The engine stopped,” said Nasir.

  “Thanks for pointing that out.” Alyssa glanced at him. “I wasn’t quite sure what that total silence was from.”

  Nasir rolled his eyes.

  Kathy shot Kenny an urgent stare by way of the rearview mirror before giving Nasir a ‘don’t mind her, she’s scared’ look.

  “Probably just a bit of crud in the fuel line. It has been sitting a while unused.” Kenny pushed the starter, but after a few seconds of it whirring without success, he jammed the shifter into ‘park’ and grabbed the door handle. “Gonna check the fuel line. Be a minute.”

  Hayley lunged forward, grabbing the tops of both front seats. “No! Stupid piece of shit! I wanna go home!”

  Beep.

  The console flickered and came online, one panel at a time. In a few seconds, the cabin tinted amber-red in the radiance of modern technology. The entire console glowed like the West City skyline at night. Four yellow lights blinked in a slow pattern, informing him that the in-wheel motors weren’t engaged. The air conditioning kicked on. Luna let out an awestruck squeal and crawled forward to put her face in the blast of cool.

  Hayley’s anger evaporated in an instant to bewilderment.

  Eldon glanced left at Hayley, shifted his gaze to Kenny for a second, and made eye contact with Hayley again. “Kid, you want this truck to work, right? To get us home?”

  “Y-yeah,” she whispered.

  “Then you keep wantin’ it to work.” Eldon patted her hand where she grasped his seatback. “You keep wantin’ it to work and don’t stop thinkin’ ’bout how you want this bucket of shit to work.”

  Kenny tapped his fingers on the wheel. What just happened?

  Eldon swatted him twice in the shoulder with the back of his hand. “Come on man. Let’s switch this mother back over and get the hell outa here.” He pushed his door open.

  Kenny hopped out, grabbed the tools, and crawled under the truck. While Eldon disconnected the drive shafts, he re-engaged the stator gears of the e-motors. Between the two of them, they had it converted back to the normal drive system in six minutes. After stowing the shafts and toolbox in the back, Kenny paused outside, gripping the handle, dreading he’d find the console dark when he opened it.

  “Get in,” yelled Eldon.

  Come on… work. Kenny yanked the door open. At the sight of the lit-up console, he resumed breathing. He climbed in, slammed the door, and accelerated hard enough to startle yelps from Cielo and Luna. Hayley continued hovering between the front seats, making faces somewhere between constipated and angry.

  “That’s it, girl. You keep on’ thinkin’ ’bout this truck workin’. Don’t waste any time bein’ scared. You got this. You own it.” Eldon smiled at her.

  A hint of a tremble still showed in Hayley’s legs, but she nodded.

  Kenny offered a reassuring smile. I dunno if she’s actually doing anything, but if it keeps her focused on not being scared… I’ll take it.

  Hayley’s confidence increased with each passing hour. Since getting the truck up to ninety mph, the Navcon adjusted its arrival estimate to 6:48 p.m, shaving about three hours off. Kenny pushed the accelerator whenever the road got clear, and cursed under his breath each time he had to back off to go around evidence of warfare or raiders.

  Everyone kept quiet, gazing out over the passing scrubland and eventual Nevada desert. Several times, dust trails emerged from the wastes, diverting toward them, but the most determined raider gave up after a minute or two. None of their vehicles had much hope of catching them at speed, and most bandits wouldn’t waste ethanol on a difficult chase.

  A little past six, Hayley’s fear seemed to have gone away. She still clutched the seats, but had the look of a general riding a command chariot rather than a terrified tween. The shadow of West City darkened the horizon not too long after.

  All the Scrags leaned forward, making gasps of awe.


  “I don’t see any fire,” whispered Gato.

  Hayley scooted back to sit. “There is no fire. It’s just a superstition.”

  “Hale? You okay?” asked Kathy.

  “Yeah. I don’t feel scared now.” She squirmed. “But I really want a shower. Still feels like I’ve got millipede guts stuck to me.”

  “Eww,” muttered Alyssa. “You had to say that, didn’t you? Now I feel it too.”

  Hayley gave her a raspberry and broke into giggles. Alyssa laughed.

  Kenny eased off some speed as the great, towering plastisteel-blue wall of West City loomed over them. The Scrag children continued staring open-mouthed. Even Halcón had a look of boyish wonder.

  “Where is the fire?” asked Gato.

  “It’s a legend.” Kenny pointed up at a turret. “Someone probably saw one of those lasers go off once. They burn what they hit.”

  “¿Es aquí donde los antepasados van?” asked Luna.

  “This is West City,” said Kenny in Spanish. “It’s not a land of the ancestors like the legends say. It’s full of real people, and modern things.”

  “Are we joining your tribe?” asked Halcón. “I would like to take your eldest daughter for a wife.”

  Alyssa gasped and went crimson.

  Kenny coughed. “Uhh. She’s fourteen. She’s not getting married yet. That’s too young.”

  “My parents were married at fourteen.” Halcón patted himself on the chest. “I am a strong warrior.”

  “You’re fifteen. That’s too young for marriage. You got a couple years of being a kid left. Things are different here. For one thing, we don’t consider people elderly when they’re halfway through their forties. There’s no need to rush yourself.”

  Halcón seemed to mull his words. “Your tribe lives to great age? They have magic to do this?”

  “Technology,” said Eldon. “You’ll see.”

  “Are you four related?” asked Kenny.

  Halcón pointed at Gato. “He is my brother. Luna and Cielo are brother and sister.”

  “Okay.” Kenny slowed to a stop by the external door of the checkpoint.

  “Wow…” Gato crawled into the front and half onto the console to stare up at the giant portal. “Is big.”

  It took the police staffing the station about a minute to notice them parked there. The enormous checkpoint door, a slab of plastisteel as wide as three lanes of road, shuddered and opened downward, sinking into the ground. The top came away from the wall above it, exposing crenelations like a gear or an old castle.

  “There are people inside who will help you. Don’t be afraid of them,” said Kenny.

  “Okay.” Halcón nodded.

  The great door shook the earth with a resounding thud as it became flush with the ground. Kenny nudged the truck up and over the metal housing, in effect a giant speedbump, and stopped in the middle of a bare metal sally port. Two Division 1 officers observed from behind a thick transparent panel, their silver-visored helmets aglow with reflected terminal screens. Another pair walked out to the truck.

  Kenny opened his door and slid out to stand.

  “Welcome back.” One officer came around his side with a handheld scanning unit.

  “Thanks”―Kenny glanced at the man’s nameplate―”Officer Hamm. Got four rescues. Scrag children. Raiders or maybe another tribe wiped out their village while they were out scavving. Caught them looting the truck.” He chuckled. “Or trying to. Since they had no family left, I brought ’em in.” He beckoned them to get out. “This is Halcón, age fifteen. That’s Gato, his brother.”

  “Tengo doce años,” said Gato.

  “Little small for twelve,” said Officer Hamm.

  Kenny blinked at the cop. “Well, I guess he missed a few appointments with his nutritionist.”

  “Right.” Hamm shook his head. “That was dumb.”

  The girl hovered at the door, one foot on the running board, one dangling. She stared around in awe at the hundred-plus story buildings a little further west, and millions of whizzing lights in the air: advert bots, hovercars, and delivery units.

  “That’s Luna; she’s ten. The scrawny little fella behind her is her brother Cielo. He’s eight. Halcón knows a bit of English, but the others only have a word or two.”

  Officer Hamm nodded. “Should we contact you once they clear medical?”

  Kenny opened his mouth to say ‘nah, put ’em into the system,’ like he’d been thinking since he first decided to bring them to civilization, but froze at the sight of Cielo clinging to Kathy. The kids could spend years sitting in an adoption queue if they didn’t get sent off to a colony world. Adjusting to the city would be hard enough, but another entire planet? He locked eyes with his wife. She brushed her hand over the boy’s wild, black hair, making him grin. Turning them in to social services had once sounded good in theory, but having to say the words ‘nah, I don’t want them’ after going through so much to get them out alive was a dick move. When he thought back to the way Luna had looked at him in the second before she fell into the dog’s mouths, he felt like an absolute asshole for even debating it.

  A low-flying advert bot the size of a box truck whizzed overhead, rumbling everything.

  Luna let out a high-pitched yelp; she ran over and grabbed on to his armored coat, shivering.

  Kenny put his arm around her. “Yeah. We’ll be submitting the paperwork first thing in the morning.

  Kathy approached with the boy attached to her side. “These kids need people who can be a bridge between their old world and this one.”

  Luna touched Officer Hamm’s stomach, speechless at the sight of gleaming blue armor. He opened his visor and smiled at her.

  “Whoa, we’re keeping them?” asked Alyssa.

  Kenny gave Luna’s shoulder a squeeze while smiling at Alyssa. “I think so. Are you okay with that?”

  “Heh.” Alyssa grinned. “I would’a had to kick your ass if we didn’t.”

  “They’re kinda cool,” said Hayley. “Having a big family would be uhh, pretty sweet.” She shrank in on herself and looked down.

  Alyssa pointed at him. “However… I’m not sharing my room.” She kicked her boot at the ground for a few seconds. “Well, maybe with Hale if I have to.”

  Hayley’s eyes widened a touch. She bit her lip and smiled at Alyssa.

  What is going on with her? Poor girl… must’ve been rough what she went through with her dad… being on her own for almost a year.

  Eldon and the other officer laughed on the far side of the truck, lost in a conversation about military stuff.

  “No need to worry about that. We can always add on to the house. Kenny gathered everyone, and spoke to the four Scrags in slow Spanish. “You have to go with these police officers for a little while. They are going to take you to a place with healers where they will make sure you are not sick. That will take a few days, and then we’d like you to come live with us. You don’t have to, but we’d be happy to welcome you into our home.”

  “We would be your tribe?” asked Halcón.

  “Not exactly. You’d think of me as your father, not your chief. Kathy as your mother.” He loomed over the boy. “And Alyssa and Hayley as your sisters.”

  Cielo grinned.

  Kenny stopped looming. “Either way, your life will change. You don’t need to be warriors and scavengers here. You’ll go to school and get a chance to just be children and have fun.”

  Halcón’s expression went pensive.

  “Think on it.” Kenny patted the boy on the shoulder. “You’ll be in the hospital for a couple days. You don’t have to decide right now.”

  Luna took Gato’s hand, then Cielo’s, and stared up at him. “I want to stay with you.”

  Halcón shook his hand. “My father has been beyond the curtain of fire since I was younger than Cielo. I am used to being a man, but I will respect you as an elder. The small ones do not want to walk separate paths.”

  Kathy smiled.

  “R
ight.” Hamm tapped at his datapad. “They’ll be taken to a medical facility for evaluation and quarantine for a couple days, interviewed by social services, and whatnot. What about the other two? Oh, never mind. They’re yours already. I found them. Anything coming into the city we should know about other than those kids?”

  Two more cops emerged from the door by the armored window and collected the Scrag children into the checkpoint facility. The kids followed without protest, continuing to gawk around at everything.

  “Crystal horse statue.” Kenny held his hands about a foot apart. “Yea or so big. Couple of plastic toys and some other crystal knickknacks. That’s it. Nothing explosive, flammable, alive, or potentially harmful.”

  Eldon glanced over and laughed. “You ate a PFS. All of that applies… explosive, flammable, probably still alive, and definitely harmful.”

  The cop he’d been talking with cringed, laughing. “He didn’t? Mean of you not to warn him.”

  “I did.” Eldon shook his head at the cop beside him. “Dude wouldn’t listen.”

  “Don’t feel anything.” Kenny scratched his stomach and grinned.

  Hamm wandered around the truck with his scanner. After two passes, he stuck it back in its holder on his belt and approached. “Looks clear. Okay, someone from social services will be contacting you, probably tomorrow morning. Good to see you made it back alive.” He chuckled, shaking his head. “I still don’t know what possesses people to run off out there.”

  “Thanks.”

  Alyssa and Hayley scrambled into the truck like their pants had been lit on fire.

  “Well… someone wants to go home.” Kenny grinned.

  Kathy kissed him. “Yep. Three someones.”

  wo motorbikes rode ahead of the squeaking, bouncy pickup truck, close enough to block most of the view with a heavy plume of dust. An occasional pebble kicked up by the bikes hit the windshield with a click. Nina sat in the center of the front bench seat between José, who drove, and Silvia, a tall woman with prominent cheekbones and long, straight hair. Unlike most of the people around her, this woman didn’t have a tale of personal tragedy driving her underground. She’d made a decision to join the resistance after hearing too many stories of bad things happening to others. According to Javier, she was the best shot of the group, already with nine kills, three of which had been the CMO officers who had attempted to arrest Nicolás, one of the psionic kids she’d seen hiding among the cots.