“That wasn’t for any of you to decide!” My fury echoes around the hangar, followed by a painful silence. I curl my hand around the brainbox, squeezing tight enough to make its edges dig into my palm. “What about the other memories? The last op?” Sasha Six’s death?
“It was not on your brainbox?” Val asks, sounding surprised, then sympathetic. The pity in her voice is wounding. “The information may have been damaged or erased. I am not sure.”
Well, that makes two of us. I’m not sure about anything anymore. I can’t trust my own thoughts, my own memories, not even my own body.
“I want to be alone, Val.” I look away from her, unwilling to let her see the devastation on my face. “Go away.”
“I will respect your wishes, Sasha,” Val says, with notable disappointment. “If you have any further questions…”
I raise one hand, my silent way of saying ‘I’ll let you know.’ When I look back, Val is gone. There’s nothing left but empty grey wall.
I slip the brainbox into my pocket and pull my legs up onto the bed in the back of the Eagle, wrapping my arms around my knees. It’s too cold to stay in the hangar forever, but I don’t care. I’d rather rely on my thermal regulation mods and let the air eat at my skin through my coat than go back down.
Why do I have mods, anyway? If this is a brand-new body, that means new mods too. Doc, most likely. She must have put them in after this body was grown, but before my ‘activation’. Probably around the same time Val convinced her to go along with the crew’s deception.
I can’t stop the tears rolling down my cheeks. They leave wet tracks on my face, heat that turns cold, but I let them keep on dripping. I don’t have much choice but to cry until I can’t anymore. Then I’ll figure this out. Alone. With six lives and deaths trapped in my head.
The sound of the lift activating makes me flinch, but I don’t look up. My head’s too heavy. Whoever it is, I don’t want to see them. Maybe if I stay like this, curled up into a ball, they’ll go away.
“Sasha?”
Elena’s voice drifts toward me, crisp in the frigid air. She sounds hoarse, like she’s strained her throat. From yelling, maybe. I don’t answer, but she approaches anyway. Her boots sound too loud scraping across the hangar’s concrete floor. “The others sent me to check on you. They thought you might actually talk to me.”
There’s not much use in hiding. I know Elena won’t go away unless I make her. Stubborn idiot. I blink away my freshest tears and turn my head sideways to look at her.
“You mean they were too scared to come up themselves.”
Elena doesn’t deny it. She climbs into the Eagle and hops onto the bed beside me, folding her legs up. There’s only a few centimeters of space between us, and I can feel heat radiating from her thigh to mine.
“Val told me what happened. It’s fucked up, Sasha. Really, really fucked up. I’m sorry.”
I open my mouth to say I don’t need Elena’s sympathy, but actually, sympathy is exactly what I need right now. And Elena’s the only person I have even a slight bond of trust with who wasn’t involved in this mess. Girl drives me crazy, but at this point, crazy’s better than liars.
“Yeah,” I say, but the sound comes out as more of a sob.
Elena hesitates as she stretches out her hand, but when I don’t move, she rests it on my back. I can barely feel it through my coat. “For what it’s worth, I don’t think those assholes wanted to hurt you. They’re all quiet down there, acting like someone died.”
“Someone did,” I point out. “Someones.”
“Yeah,” Elena sighs. “I saw.”
Logically, I know Elena saw something. The way she looked at me in that room, like she was staring at a ghost. She must have watched me die at the very least, and maybe absorbed some of my other memories too. “How much did you see?”
“All of it. The memories were sped up, but I felt—I saw you die. Six times.”
I get the sense the first verb was more accurate. I also get the sense Elena knows me a lot better than she did a few hours ago.
“It was a trap,” Elena continues when I don’t respond. “At least, that’s what Val and I think. Someone rigged your memories to, well…explode inside your mind. The rapid download of your deaths would have kept your physical body in a state of shock long enough for the guards to come and deal with you.”
There it is. The cherry on top of the shit sundae. I know what it’s like to die now. The unbearable shout of pain that goes through your body as it breaks. The helplessness. The cold. Maybe that’s why this cold doesn’t bother me. It’s nothing in comparison.
“But I took the hit instead,” Elena says softly, “and you and Val got me out of that basement.” She pauses, looking at me with an expression I haven’t seen her use often. It takes me a while to place it as worry. “Are you okay, Sasha? You’re not saying anything.”
I exhale. “It started with a logistics question. Megan needed some experimental tech, but it was guarded by an army. The only way to get to it was to cut through a reactor core. Whoever went in would be exposed to a lethal dose of radiation, so...I volunteered.”
Elena isn’t surprised. I guess she shouldn’t be, if she’s seen snippets of my life.
“Rami made a joke about clones. About how the corp families sometimes grow replacement body parts when one of theirs stopped working, or sometimes even entire new bodies. The memory-transfer process doesn’t always go off without a hitch, but…” I laugh bitterly. “For beauty and longevity, some people are willing to take those risks. So wouldn’t it be nice, Rami said, if one of us had one.”
I wait, but Elena doesn’t speak. She keeps listening, wearing a sympathetic look that simultaneously pisses me off and urges me to keep on rambling like an idiot. “I know Rami was joking, but Megan…she took it seriously. Couple days later, she approached me. Said she thought she could replicate the process for one of us. ‘Someone could stay behind,’ she told me.”
My eyes flick down to my boots. The first time, I’d still held out hope I could get out of the op alive, contrary to what the plan said. It was all a theory, I’d told myself. And what was my body really worth anyway, if Megan could just grow me a new one? Surely helping her create Val, a FRAI who could help scientists cure disease, who could use a combined analysis of history and diplomacy and advocacy to come up with peaceful solutions to armed conflicts before they even started, who could change the entire world for the better, was worth that small sacrifice. It was worth going near a reactor, jumping in front of a Puls.wav, intentionally setting off a security system, covering a retreat.
I had been naïve. When I woke up as Sasha Two, I remembered the pain of dying. A pain I can recall all too clearly now. And yet, I’d done it again. And again. And again. To make Val the best she could be, and then, when that dream soured, to keep my friends alive. According to previous Sashas, that cause had been easier to die for.
“Sasha…” Elena looks like she wants to reach out and touch me. I tense up.
“Thought you didn’t crewbond, and last I checked, you hated me. What’s with the sympathy?”
Elena sends a sharp burst of air between her teeth, not quite laughter. “I don’t hate you, stupid. I watched you sacrifice yourself for other people and an ideal six fucking times.” She cups the back of my neck, warming the exposed patch of skin there. “How could I hate a person like that?”
“What if I’m not that person?” I ask. “What if she’s…they’re…someone else?”
“Maybe some of this you is different, maybe not. But that’s the same. You’ve saved my ass enough times to prove it.”
“But how do you know?”
Elena rolls her eyes. “Fine, fine. Fuck it. I don’t hate people who get me off four times, then.”
I don’t laugh, but the pain in my chest doesn’t throb quite as hard either.
“Hey, Jefecita…”
I lift my head. Elena’s hand moves to my cheek, just for a moment.
“I’m hanging ar
ound for now. You know?”
I get it. She’s telling me she’ll be here, for…whatever. If I wasn’t already reeling, I’d be shocked. Elena’s had one foot out the door this whole time. Some mornings, I was surprised to see her—never more than when she got in the shuttle to go to Hong Kong.
All I’ve got the energy for is a shrug and a noncommittal noise, but that seems to be enough for Elena. Her fingers tighten the barest bit on the back of my neck and then she leans up, pausing to look into my eyes. Warm breath trails from her mouth in wisps of silver cloud, floating near my lips. I don’t pull back.
Elena kisses me. It’s soft. Short. She pulls away before I can respond, right after I’ve gotten a taste of lip gloss. Strawberries, not vanilla.
My eyes burn again, wet. “You don’t even know who you kissed.”
“Yeah,” Elena says softly, “I do.”
Her fingers trail briefly over my shoulder as she pulls her hand away and hops down from the Eagle. Her boots hit the concrete with a loud, echoing thud. “Don’t stay up here all night. Or at least turn the engine on. I’m not chipping your dumb ass out of an ice block tomorrow.”
She stares at me for a moment, giving me a chance to call her back. I don’t. I don’t want to. Do I?
She sighs, heading back for the lift.
Once Elena’s gone, I put my knees down and climb into the Eagle, closing the doors behind me. I’ll run the engine for a while. The cold’s getting to me.
Monday, 06-14-65 16:23:51
IT TAKES TEN HOURS to fly to New Zealand, going the long way. Piloting the Eagle over an ocean of crimson pohutukawa trees is like drifting on the surface of a dream. It’s familiar, but unsettling, a backwards reflection of reality. The blood-red flowers on the heavy, swaying branches beneath the shuttle’s belly aren’t supposed to blossom at all in the middle of June. But trees have memories, and the pohutukawas around AukPrep still listen to science’s timetable, even though nature has taken over the compound. They've been genetically engineered. Grown in a laboratory, like me.
I bring the Eagle down over an empty patch of lawn. Everything is silent except for the plasma engine. There are no other shuttles, no groundskeepers, no students. Not a surprise. I’ve kept up with the place in the news as the years rolled on. It would have been a waste of resources to repair it, AxysGen had said. They’ve got a new place in Sydney now, shiny chrome buildings that bounce light off the sea with sterile white dormitories inside.
I switch the engine off. The silence grows louder. It takes me a moment to open the door. I know once I step outside, I’ll inhale and think back. But there’s nothing for it, so I push the button. The first scent that greets my nose is the damp green of the river. It’s stronger than I’m expecting, but the smell of compost from years ago is absent. Tui birds call from somewhere nearby, singing bell-notes that waver in the air before popping them with sharp clicks and grating gasps. My stomach tightens. This place is both like and unlike my memories. It’s different. Deteriorated.
I turn toward the main building, avoiding a direct stare, but the gleam yanks me in. It’s all silver and glass, unnaturally bright—until it isn’t. Two thirds of the giant ‘U’ shape are structurally sound, but the last third has fallen away, a jungle of twisted steel support beams over a floor of broken glass.
The front doors are still standing when I reach them. They’re jammed halfway open by a large metal desk. I don’t remember who wedged it there, but I remember climbing over it on my way out, after the explosion. That was before my noise-cancelling mods were installed—or, before the original Sasha’s were. I hadn’t realized one of my eardrums was ruptured until I touched the heat running down my neck and my fingers came away wet with blood. Fixing that had cost the last of the credits I had. After that, it was me and my pistol, running solo ops to eat.
I hop the desk and step inside. Fallen leaves are scattered across the floor, curled up and dried out, blown in by the wind where the wall is gone. Dust motes float above me, glittering in uneven beams of sunlight. A weta scurries beside my boot, scrambling in search of its hole. I give it a wide berth. I’d gotten a bite to the back of the shoulder one night years ago, when Megan and I snuck out of our dorm to trade kisses on a blanket under the trees. I’d shot bolt upright beneath her, squirming in surprise and pain with my hand still stuck under her shirt.
She’d stepped on it. I asked why. “Because it bit you,” she said, like I was stupid. We’d laughed about it, but I wasn’t sure why I was laughing. Because it felt good to exist with another person, I guess. That’s the problem with people. They always end up disappearing, disappointing you, or both.
I exit the entryway and head up the main stairs. They’re still stable. What remains of the building is structurally sound, all things considered. It’s cleaner on the second of five floors. Not as many creatures have chosen to make the journey upward. It’s dim despite the sunlight filtering in through the windows. The air smells stale, in need of recycling.
The hallway seems shorter than I remember, or maybe my legs are longer. Megan and I weren’t in the same classes, and this was her floor. Because of ‘superior generalized aptitude’ I was marked for Gold Star. Megan was shuttled into Subsection 2B—although we called it the jacker factory. Sometimes it pisses me off that AxysGen figured out what we’d become before we did. Pisses me off more when I think about how what Megan became was ‘dead’, and about how what I became is…
No. That’s not AxysGen’s fault. I want it to be, but it’s Megan’s. Which is really why I’m here, because I don’t understand. I have almost the whole picture now, but it’s not enough. I need to know: How could someone who loved me convince me to die for her project six different times? I’m afraid of the answer, because I can already feel it creeping up on me. There isn’t one, because it’s the wrong question. Someone who loves…loved…me couldn’t watch me go through that. Not just watch me go through it, she’d talked me into it. And I said yes. Why the hell did I say yes?
Before a chunk of building that rests in pieces on the ground, there’s a sliding door. The power’s off, but my utility belt has an emergency cable. I put a little juice into the door, and the pressure pad glows long enough for me to press my hand there. Aside from the dust, this room is empty. No windows, just blank walls and rows upon rows of terminals. It’s set up like an AxysGen jacker warehouse, which is exactly what it is. I remember what it looked like filled with people: flickering lights, blank eyes staring at nothing, the air a swirl of perfume, sweat, and dry carbon dioxide. They’ve got pumps for extra oxygen, but with so many people, it was a losing battle at best.
This had been Megan’s world for years. Cramped, crowded, but also lonely, every minute dictated by flashing digital clocks on the walls. Most of the ‘free time’ at AukPrep was highly supervised, at least for kids from the slums. One of the only reasons we’d managed to find any private moments at all was because we’d been roommates too.
I glance around the room one more time. I won’t find the answers I’m looking for here. It explains part of how Megan had convinced me to leave, sure, but I’d already known that. Growing up poor had never diminished Megan’s desire for more. A girl with big dreams like hers wasn’t meant to be stuck in a place like this. It was a gilded cage compared to the decaying outer circles of the cities, but it was still a cage. It doesn’t explain how she talked me into death, though. It doesn’t explain why she died, or what AxysGen wants with me.
I leave the jacker factory and head up another set of stairs. It’s brighter here, because the walls are mostly window. A few are broken, but most are still solid. The modified glass is practically invisible, letting the late afternoon sunlight stream in. Most of the hall is lined with narrow doorways, all the same shape and size, leading to identical rooms.
It doesn’t take me long to find mine—Room 77, middle of the first hallway. It wasn’t destroyed in the blast, although it’s close to a collapsed wall that opens to the outside world. This door doesn�
��t have power either, but it can be used manually. I pull it open and step inside.
Aside from a few sun-stains on the sheets and dust on the furniture, the room is exactly how I remember. Two beds, two desks, two dressers, one closet, one attached bathroom. Some of the newer rooms like ours had window seats, but that was the only extra feature I ever saw in an APS kid’s room. Maybe the fifth floor, where the corp kids stayed on weekdays, was different, but I’d never been invited up there, and I don’t feel like going now. My curiosity’s over a decade and a half too old.
I head over to the window seat and pull up the flat cushion on top. Underneath, burned into the metal that’s coated to look like wood, there’s a heart with two initials: M.D + S.Y. Old, but still bright. I can feel the familiar ridges under my palm without even touching it.
God, we’d been so young. I’d wanted someone to love so badly. Someone to love me back. The first night we were together, lips joined, hesitant fingertips dipping beneath clothes, I thought I’d found it. When Megan kissed me and looked into my eyes, sliding her hand around my hip, I’d really thought…
“Haven’t you ever wanted to become a god? Create your own future?”
I remember that moment so viscerally that I can almost hear Megan’s voice in my ear. She’d exposed herself that night and I hadn’t even realized. I’d felt like a god then, with our skin bathed in sweat and moonlight and the smell of vanilla in my nose. I’d felt like I could conquer the whole world. But looking back, knowing what she’d really meant, knowing I was just a tool for her to use while she created Val.
“FRAIs are gonna change the world, Sasha, I know it. And mine’s going to be smarter, faster, better than those half-assed programs the corps call AIs. Better than humans, too. I just need a few more credits. A little more time…”
It’s only now that I realize I’d always added ‘for the greater good’ to the ends of Megan’s sentences. FRAIs like Val would change the world, for the greater good. Megan always needed a little more time, a few more resources, for the greater good. That’s why I’d gone along with her plan to escape from AukPrep. She’d said we needed to stage it, so the corps wouldn’t try to track down their ‘investments.’ She’d said it would look like an accident. She’d said no one would get hurt. She’d been lying.
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