by Jadah McCoy
“Please don’t let it be bodies.” A shudder runs through me. “Please don’t let it be bodies.”
I try to stand up, moving out of Bastion’s way before he falls on me. I lose my footing on the mush shifting beneath me and slide into the stagnant water.
Bastion drops out of the chute a few seconds after I do. The soft squish of him landing sticks in my ears.
He groans.
“Please don’t tell me what we landed in.” I wring the water from my body.
In the darkness, he shakes his arms and something thick and wet splatters against the wall. “No problem.”
I splash around in the knee-deep stream, hands in front of me as I clamber for the ledge to climb up.
“Here, let me help you.” Bastion’s hands grasp mine, and he lifts me up.
“Can you see?” I ask.
“Night vision. One of the many perks of being a manufactured person.”
With ease, he pulls me up onto the concrete ledge with him. Water sloshes out of my soaked shoes, and I slide around a bit on the slick ground. Bastion holds me closer to him until I regain my footing. I really don’t want to know what’s making it so slippery down here. Probably just algae or mold, or one of those other things that love the damp darkness. I hope.
“You’re sure handy to have around in the event of an emergency. How do we get out of here?”
“Don’t you worry your pretty little head about that,” he says. “Let’s just say I have insider information.”
My eyes are adjusting to the thick blackness. I can make out the gentle curve of tunnels around us, as well as the ledge to my left that dips off into the sewer water I fell into.
“The slums shouldn’t be too far from here,” he says.
“My feet might fall off before we get there.”
“Michelo can make you a new pair.” There’s laughter in his voice.
He folds my arm into the crook of his own and guides me through the maze of tunnels like a gentleman. I was raised in sewers such as these, splashing around in the filthy water, pushing my luck with Sanders as I ventured out too far from the Sanctuary. Serge and Lucca always chickened out, but I never had any problems exploring the silent, lightless places.
This place, though, is unfamiliar. It’s disconcerting to walk through a sewer and not know which way leads to what. Even in pitch blackness, I could navigate the tunnels around the Sanctuary, but here I know nothing, and it rankles me.
“Do you have siblings?” he asks, holding my arm close.
“What?” I’m not sure I’ve heard him correctly.
“Do you… have siblings? Is that the correct term?”
“We’ve almost died a thousand times and you’re making polite conversation about my family tree.” This man.
“Yes, well, would you rather me prattle on about our impending doom?”
He tugs me to a stop, and I hear him land in the dirty stream below us with a splash. His hands grasp mine as he guides me into the water beside him. We cross the stream and climb onto the opposite ledge.
“No, I suppose not.” I suppress the grin on my face. “The answer is, no, I don’t have any siblings. How about you?”
He makes a pensive sound. “There are other androids with whom I was manufactured. So I suppose, in that sense, I have many brothers and sisters.”
“That—”
From far away there’s a gentle kerplunk as something falls into the water. Bastion stops walking, bringing me to a halt beside him.
“Keep your voice down.” His body brushes mine as he twists around.
“What is it?” The hiss of my voice carries through the tunnels, too loud.
He doesn’t answer.
“I’m not sure,” he says after a long moment.
Our pace hastens, and Bastion no longer crosses the water by jumping in. He leaps across and grasps my hand as I do the same with his help, though not nearly as gracefully and with many more falls against the hard surfaces.
We don’t talk, either. He’s too busy listening.
I notice it, too. Where once the tunnels were silent as the dead, now a chorus of sounds echo off the walls. Drips and clicks and splashing, and I can’t tell where any of it is coming from, but it’s always too close for comfort. That smell from where we fell through the chute, that terrible smell follows us. The smell of death.
The rapid clicking almost sounds like laughter.
The bones inside me burn with cold and ache to run away from whatever is obviously stalking us in the darkness. The hairs on my arms and neck rise, and not because of my wet clothes or the chilly temperature.
“Don’t run,” Bastion mutters, obviously sensing the tension in my body.
Something watches me. It’s in here with us and I can’t see it, but I think Bastion can.
“Syl, there’s a ladder directly to your right. I don’t mean to alarm you, but I need you to climb as quickly as you can.” His tone is even.
“What’s going on?”
A low growl echoes through the tunnel, but I can’t tell where it’s coming from or how far away it is.
He pushes my hands onto the icy-cold ladder rungs, and I propel my weight upward, content not to ask any more questions. I hear the ting, ting of his dress shoes following me up.
“You told me not to tell you what we landed in.”
“But that was way back there,” I call down to him.
“Yes, well, it seems to have followed us here.”
Ice shoots through my veins, and all of a sudden, I can’t climb fast enough. Muscles in my thighs and arms burn as I climb. Below us, I hear scratching and tearing, a noise that sounds like claws on concrete. My stomach drops into my shoes, and the beating of my heart blocks out all the other noise.
“Go! Go!” He presses an impatient hand to my legs.
The ladder vibrates as whatever is following joins us in our ascent.
My head bumps something hard—the manhole cover. I let go of the rung with one arm and push with all my might. It lifts up an inch, a trickle of light coming through the crack.
Bastion climbs up behind me, his body pressed hard against mine in the claustrophobic concrete tube. He grunts behind me as he pushes against the cover as well. With a loud scraping noise, it finally lifts, and he pushes it to the side.
I scuttle out of the hole, Bastion’s hands on my backside giving me momentum as he pushes me out. I catch myself from falling against the cobblestone and stand up. I grab Bastion by the front of his suit and pull. He pops out of the hole, stumbling into me. His pant leg is tattered at the edge, and the rubber of his dress shoe is gaping open, ripped apart by something.
We whip around, Bastion pushing me backward as a wrinkled, gelatinous face follows him out of the darkness. It almost looks human except for the bloated, white-eyed appearance, and the jagged, cracked, decaying teeth.
I jerk backward as sunlight hits the creature’s face. It shrieks and retracts back into the sewers.
I stumble away from the hole. “What the fuck is that?”
Bastion lets out a breath. “Well, it’s not a lab rat, I can tell you that.”
When I look down, my gloved hands and shoes are stained black from whatever nasty, squishy decay we fell into back there. Frustrated, I growl as I tug the shoes from my aching feet.
Like walking barefoot will really be what catches everyone’s attention when I’m covered in shit and death, and reek like a week-old body sitting in the sun.
“I hate this place!” I throw the boots at a shadowy corner. They bounce off the wall and land a few feet away. “And all its awful experiments.”
“Well, don’t take it out on the wall,” Bastion says, crossing his arms and studying me.
I sit down against the wall I just assaulted, and he looks around before kneeling in front of me. No one is present in the tiny alley we’ve climbed into. It’s deserted, and I wonder if news of Pontus’s death has reached the Elitians and if that has anything to do with the quiet.
“I promise we’re only a few blocks away. We can go the back way.”
I nod, the coarse wall catching on my hair with the movement. He releases my foot and I stand up, my bones and muscles screaming in protest. I lean down and grab my boots. Bastion pushes the manhole cover back in its original spot with a loud grating sound.
We sneak in silence through the uninhabited alleys. The mechanical skeletons with their disjointed, unfinished bodies stare up at us as we walk by. They never speak. I wonder if they even have the ability to.
An unbearable itch starts up on the back of my scalp, and I scratch it without thought as we walk. But when I pull my hand away, a handful of blue hair comes with it.
Bastion looks over at me, and I toss it behind my back.
“What is it?” he asks.
“Nothing.” I force a smile. It’s happening. I’m changing. Dread pools in my belly. “It’s nothing.”
Bastion
he messages from Micro do not stop.
I anticipated this and preemptively set up an automatic reply for her—I am currently breaking into CorpEx while impersonating an officer. If you should have need of me before I return, please wait until the agreed upon time and meet me at the agreed upon place.
That elicits the first wave of angry disbelief from her. The “you must be jokings” and “you’ve gone mads” roll in steadily as I follow Pontus around, lashing out at the poor Elitians lining the slum roads at his command for whatever imagined slight, like kicking stray animals. This is what gives him joy. It sickens me. My skin crawls to hear his laughter.
He is certainly a man of many faces, and whoever has the most money and power will no doubt get to see the prettiest one.
When I aim the cannon at his face, the ugliest one he has, and pull the trigger, I’ve never felt a greater satisfaction. Seeing Syl’s eyes brighten when she realizes she won’t die is a close second.
Micro’s messages continue until finally I receive one that says, “What have you done?”
It’s the last one I get, right after Syl and I are dumped into the sewer. I’m not surprised at all when we return to a topside world that is silent and deserted, save for the oldest models who haven’t a care whether they live or are shut down for good. It’s a bit like a boot is up in the air and the rest of us are waiting for it to come down and crush us under the weight.
If I had to guess, it probably wouldn’t take long for that to happen.
Syl and I creep through the back door of Michelo’s shop, the old, ungreased hinges creaking open. I slip in behind Syl, and it seems as if Michelo has been waiting for us. He stands, shrouded in the darkness of the back room, his eyes knowing and unsurprised when they fall on Syl and I covered in filth, our clothes torn. A weapon waits in his hand.
He was expecting someone to show up, but I’m not so sure it was us.
“There’s a tribute to Pontus tonight at the square. I don’t suppose you two would have anything to do with that, would you?” he says.
“Nothing at all. Hadn’t even heard of the poor fellow’s passing until now.” I mean for it to be lighthearted, but even to my own cochlear inserts, it sounds a bit defensive.
“Just as I thought.” His voice is gravel.
Syl steps in front of me. “We didn’t have a choice.”
“You didn’t have a choice.” Michelo’s voice is cool, and he gestures to Syl. “But this one did.”
She bristles beside me. “I didn’t ask him to come after me.”
“Oh, but didn’t you, though, with those big blue eyes?”
Syl steps closer to the mechanic who towers a foot above her. He could crush her bones into a polished cubic centimeter ornament for his door if he really wanted to, but she shows no fear.
“Say what you’re trying to say, old man. Don’t dumb it down for the human.”
I place a hand on her shoulder, keen to diffuse the situation before it gets any worse. She would fight him like an angry kitten would fight a dog, but she would still lose. There is much tension in this room, and I’m afraid it will lead one of us to say something we might regret.
Michelo looks at me. “I’m saying this is what happens when you stick your nose, among other things, in places where they don’t belong.”
Like that.
I grip Syl’s shoulder a bit tighter, sighing. I speak quickly, cutting off her no doubt vicious reply. His comments are not what this conversation is really about.
“Michelo, it had to be done. Maybe not today, maybe not months from now, but someday.”
“It did not have to be you, my friend.” There is desperation in his voice, and I know he, too, must sense the boot hovering over us, ready to crush metal bone and plastic flesh.
“If not me, then who? If not now, then when?” I meet his gaze. “I am not afraid.”
At that, he steps back, all the fight gone from him. “What’s done today is done today. Possibly the worst day for it to be done, but nothing can be changed about that. You two better get down into storage. Metrovog’s already had PICs checking his place.”
“What—”
“They’re testing for biomatter, for any sign of Organics in this area. They’re also searching for Glitches.”
And there it is. That lovely other boot I’ve been waiting to fall. That didn’t take long at all, just as I’d thought. My mind wanders to Micro. It’s been a while since I’ve heard from her.
Everything all right? I send to her.
There’s no immediate answer, which is atypical for her. I don’t ponder on it too much, though. She’s probably just angry with me. It wouldn’t be the first time she’s given me the cold shoulder, so to speak.
I nod solemnly to Michelo. I may as well resign myself to life underground if the PICs are cracking down on Glitches.
Sympathizers start wiping your homes of biomatter because it’s only a matter of time before we come for you. The late Pontus’s words, spoken in front of the who’s who of New Elite—the engineers, the businesswomen, the wealthy. Those with glitches and those without.
Pontus’s death—Pontus’s murder—will be seen as retaliation after his display today. Micro is right when she says I should think about the consequences first.
“Well, go on, then. I have to run the scanner again. Clean up after you, as usual.”
Guilt thrums through me. It’s times like these when I despise the faulty wiring that maps its way through my metal hull. I want to say something to him, but I’m not sure what.
“Will you be all right?” I whisper.
He doesn’t look up at me. “Don’t worry about me, boy. I’ve been surviving since before the blueprint of your model was ever thought of.”
I watch him for a moment, hoping he’ll say something more. He doesn’t.
I guide Syl by the shoulders from the darkness of the back room and down a corridor. She says nothing. When we’re out of his sight, she jerks free of my grip. I don’t fight her, but give her the space she requires.
“I hate this.” She crosses her arms over her stomach.
“There’s not much to like about it.” I sigh again. “Michelo’s just worried, is all. And he’s right to.”
She looks at me, the hardness draining from her gaze. It’s replaced by the soft shine of vulnerability, though she turns away to hide it.
At the end of the corridor, a door waits, and beside it, a shelf filled with yet more instruments and tools. A long, cylindrical object rests innocently in the corner of a middle shelf—an ink pen. An antiquated device, truly. I step over to the shelves and press down on the pen with one finger. It sinks into the wood with a sharp clicking sound.
With a hiss, a seam appears in the wall behind us and a slab slips to the side, revealing even more darkness beyond. I step over the threshold, and Syl follows me. As we step
in, the overhead lights kick on with a gentle hum. Another hiss resounds as the hidden door closes behind us, the seam melding into the wall again.
She glances around. “What is this place?”
“It’s where Michelo keeps the more, er, questionable items of his collection.”
“Questionable?”
“You’ll see.”
We step over piles of books and rusty old contraptions and thick trails of wires until we reach the bottom of the steps. Michelo’s secret storage is profoundly messy. Objects clutter everything with no rhyme or reason for their organization. I’m not sure what most of them are for, but I do know they probably haven’t seen the light of day in centuries.
Lights down here aren’t so clinical, due to a few of them being out. One side of the room flickers dimly.
I try to navigate through the piles of mess as Syl walks around, touching everything as she goes. She trails her fingertips across the patterns of a musty old rug hung up on the wall. She holds up a tube-shaped device with a rounded, flared end and then sets it back down.
“What is all this stuff?” she asks.
I shrug, cringing when I knock something off and it clatters to the floor. Not that it matters—this whole floor is soundproofed.
“Michelo has a fascination with all things Organic. These are things he’s found over the years, was able to salvage after the war. Not really socially acceptable, though. Can’t have high-paying New Elite customers seeing propaganda like this, you know.”
She makes a noise of affirmation.
I reach a chair next to a rotting wooden desk across the room, tug off my dirty suit jacket, and drape it over the back of the chair. I push up the sleeves of the dress shirt beneath. It’s liberating to be able to move my arms freely again.
There must be spare clothes around here somewhere. Michelo would be remiss in his duties as an Organic smuggler if he didn’t have a change of clothes tucked away in every little crack and crevice.
I open cabinet doors and look in the rusted metal hull of a twenty-second century automobile. After scouring the room, I finally find something that could pass as clothing for Syl. I, however, will have to suffer in these wretched trousers for a little longer.