The art expo was downtown, near the river, in an old city auditorium. Ida parked her motorcycle after finding an empty spot on Rochester street.
As she entered the hall, she took in the size and scope of the expo, surprised to find so many people there. Aisles of small tents housed artist displays of paintings and other artwork. She wound her way through rows upon rows of oil paintings, charcoal sketches, and photographs. Fascinated, she stopped at one artist’s booth to take in his paintings of Spark City. She couldn’t stop staring at one painting in particular. It showed the city’s riverscape in muted sienna shades. She studied it so long the man in the tent finally asked her what she thought.
“It’s, I…” Ida rarely found herself lost for words. “The city is beautiful.”
The artist smiled. “I’m glad I was able to capture that.”
She regained her senses, stuffed her hands into her pockets, and muttered, “Thanks.”
She traveled another circuit among the tents before finding Lucy’s booth which she shared with four other teenage artists. A few of her paintings hung on the side of the tent, while others were propped up on the table or positioned strategically on the ground.
Lucy’s face lit up. “Hey, Ida!” She emerged from behind the table. “I’m so glad you came. Can you believe the turnout? It’s amazing! I’ve already sold two pieces.”
“Wow, that’s great,” said Ida, taking in her artwork. “Your work…” she paused, “It’s wonderful. You have real talent.”
Lucy blushed. “Thanks. It means so much to me.”
Ida glanced around the large hall. “This is something. I had no idea so many people would be here.”
Lucy smiled. “Yeah, we’re thrilled. People need art in their lives, it turns out.”
They lingered for a moment before Lucy said she had something behind the table to show Ida. “It’s an unveiling. I’ve been waiting to show you. It wasn’t ready until today.” She stepped into the tent and emerged with a large painting wrapped in brown paper. Lucy slid it across the table to Ida. “A gift.”
“What?” Ida said. “Kid, I don’t need anything from you.”
“Please, open it.” Lucy’s eyes shone bright.
Ida slid a gloved finger underneath a piece of tape and removed the wrapping to reveal the backside of the painting. She carefully turned it over and frowned.
“You don’t like it?”
Ida struggled for words. “Is that supposed to be me?”
“Yes.”
The painting showed a gloved woman holding a gun pointing up in each hand. Complete with black leather jacket, brown pants, and combat boots, there was no mistaking it was Ida. Lucy had captured the details of her face and dark crimson hair.
Even more striking was the background. Lucy had painted Spark City’s skyline in the distance, and behind Ida, on one side, a line of android police gathered. On the other side, an army of citizens—humans and hybrid—held their ground.
The citizens looked strong and defiant against the robot force. Ida seemed like their leader.
Ida pushed the painting back into the paper. “I don’t know what daydream fantasy life you have going on in that mind of yours, but you can’t paint shit like this.”
Lucy was speechless. Paul came over beside her; he’d been talking to a few other people from school on the other side of the tent. Sensing a conflict, he nudged her arm. “Everything okay?” he whispered.
“I could…we could get in a lot of trouble for this,” said Ida. She grabbed the painting and took off with it, leaving Lucy to deal with her disappointment.
How could the girl be so stupid? Ida wondered where could she ditch the painting without causing suspicion. Several police droids patrolled the borders of the expo.
As she made her way through a long aisle filled with attendees and artists, a droid traveled straight toward her. She held the painting under one arm and nonchalantly ducked into a tent to admire paintings, hoping the robot would pass her by. She thanked herself for wearing the hat, hoping that would disguise her well enough.
Had the planetarium battle been filmed? Did Vance Drem know to look for an antisocial ex-soldier and a wolf mutant?
Inside the tent, she pretended to examine a painting while keeping view of her periphery. A few feet away, the droid paused and scanned from side to side. The droid was filming the scene, Ida realized. She didn’t know much about the police droids, but knew they were equipped with always on cameras—except when they were sued for misconduct. When accused, the story was always that the cameras had malfunctioned or been disabled. Nobody even bothered to challenge them anymore.
Ida continued admiring a painting, but the bot had scanned her profile, and then crossed to the other aisle. She’d been caught on film. Damn. Was it beaming video to someone who was reviewing footage?
Thinking fast, she dropped to her knees while the bot filmed the tent on the other side. She started crawling underneath the tables, still grasping Lucy’s painting. Ida crawled as fast as she could, dodging people’s feet and other junk stored underneath the tables.
She didn’t stop to see where the bot had gone. As she crawled, she spied an exit a few more tables down the row, but another pair of robot boots stomped down the aisle. She scrambled in another direction.
A few artists tending booths noticed her, but they went on about their business. She found an empty tent and lingered a minute. But she nearly jumped out of her skin when she heard a voice say, “Stay where you are. They’re searching for you.”
Ida lay on her side and looked up to see the artist she had spoken with earlier, the one who had painted the beautiful Spark City scenes. A robot halted in front of his tent. “May I help you?” he said.
“Have you seen this woman?” The android showed him a screen.
The artist shook his head. “Not around here.”
The robot pressed on to the next tent.
From the ground, Ida peered up at the man behind the table, as he whispered to her. “You’re in danger. More and more police droids are coming. People are getting nervous and leaving.”
The man bent over to pull a duffel bag from the other side of his table. “Take this.” He gave her a faded gray sweatshirt that said Spark City Warriors. “And leave that,” he said, pointing at her painting. “I’ll watch over it. You can pick it up. I have a small shop on North and Leavitt.” He passed her a digital card.
“I’ll pay you back,” said Ida, pulling the oversized sweatshirt on over her jacket. She slowly rose from the ground and took the chair beside him, assessing the situation. He was right. Multiple police droids patrolled the expo, checking every aisle.
As a final kindness, the man tossed her his artist exhibitor badge. She hung it around her neck and crossed the aisle, trying to blend in as best she could among the nervous art expo attendees who decided to leave because of the increased police activity. Lots of droids gathering in one place spelled disaster.
Just as she neared the end of the long aisle, ready to squeeze out of a corner exit, she felt a sharp tug on her shoulder. One of the robots had grabbed a corner of her bulky sweatshirt. She halted.
“Show me your badge,” the droid said. Ida slowly gripped the exhibitor badge in her gloved hands. She glanced at it, seeing the face of the kind black man who had hidden her.
As she started to turn the badge, a woman’s hysterical voice rose above the din. Paul ran over toward Ida and addressed the robot, drawing its attention. “Hey. My friend’s purse was stolen!”
Spark City police droids were notorious for being violent and unpredictable, but a lesser-known quirk was that they couldn’t multitask well. Once a robot had focused on a target, it became hard to pull it away.
At her tent, Lucy cried and panicked. Ida recognized they were risking everything, including their lives, to pull this stunt. Risking everything to help her escape.
The robot turned sideways toward Paul. “My friend’s purse was underneath the table, next to our chairs, w
hen someone came along and stole it,” he explained.
The robot dismissed Ida. “Move along, citizen.” It turned and approached Lucy’s table.
She glanced at Lucy, who made brief eye contact as she wiped tears from her face with a tissue. Then Ida melded with the crowd, making a stealthy exit.
Now she owed Lucy and Paul, and she didn’t like it one bit.
Twenty-Two
Vance stared through the giant windows of his luxury penthouse apartment with his forehead pressed against the glass. He’d been listless for two hours as the sun set and evening crept across Spark City.
Nancy perched on his living room sofa, silent. He’d dismissed J-Man and Singlet. They needed a night off occasionally, and they tended to stay close and hang out at his club, The Phoenix, anyway.
Vance knew she was scared of him. Scared of his volatility. He’d forced her to watch as he strangled the junkie who had the video footage. Cringing, she’d looked as though she would vomit.
Her fear was fun in a way. How long would it take for her to break down? She looked exhausted.
There’d been a visitor today. A private meeting between Vance and a doctor. Nancy had morphed into his captive executive assistant. She knew his schedule and organized all his appointments now, but this one had been off the record.
The doctor had been in and out of his penthouse in thirty minutes. Afterwards, Vance hadn’t emerged from his room for another two hours. He needed time to be alone, meditating on his condition.
Finally, he’d emerged into the living room, where Nancy waited. Sometimes he confided in her. This was proving to be one of those nights.
Vance turned and quietly stepped away from the view of the river and downtown lights.
He snapped his fingers. “Music.” A hypnotic symphony of opera swept through the room. The notes seemed part of the room itself.
“You like this requiem? I can tell.” With a small smile, Vance sidestepped swiftly through the living room, past Nancy and into his kitchen, where he pulled a bottle of champagne from a cooler.
The music continued to play while Nancy rested on the Italian leather sofa. Vance popped the cork and appeared a minute later with two glasses. He took a seat across from her on a plush, bright blue designer chair.
As always, Vance was impeccably dressed in a tailored suit. His taste in the finer things carried over into his decor. The place looked like something out of an architectural magazine.
He proposed a toast. “To life, Nancy.” She accepted with a clink of her glass. He drank in the liquid, feeling the crisp bubbles on his throat. She relaxed slightly.
“You like the vintage?” asked Vance.
She nodded.
“Bravo.” He took another drink and his features darkened. “I toast to life, and it bites me in the ass. Life is dreary, Nancy. And incredibly short.”
Nancy’s gaze fixed on him through her glasses.
“Do you know the man who came to see me today?”
Nancy shook her head slowly.
“Do you have a guess?”
She paused a moment, letting the question settle. “A doctor, I suppose.”
“Mmm,” said Vance. “A highly paid specialist. The best in the world at what he does.” Vance swirled his champagne. “He specializes in rare, life-threatening diseases.” He gazed outside.
“Cancer?” she asked.
“Cancer of the blood,” he said softly. “He flew here overnight from Switzerland to deliver the news. I was so close, Nancy. Spark City would have been safer for everyone. I was going to create the best army the world has ever seen.”
“You mean your police droids?”
He turned toward her. “But they were going to be so much more than just police. What’s everyone’s worst fear? That the Heavies will win the war and infiltrate all our cities. That they’ll wipe out the human race. We’re facing extinction.”
He studied her face.
“But many people are just wondering how to survive at all—where their next meal is coming from,” she said.
He laughed. “None of that matters if we’re going to be annihilated.”
“So, how? How will you save us?”
“My androids are police, army, and protector. I can produce them by the hundreds of thousands. An incredible military force. They’ll not only protect everyone in Spark City, but I'll send them to destroy the Heavies.”
“How come you haven’t made this public—that you have a solution to fight the enemy?”
“All in good time, Nancy. I can’t risk the military taking over my factories, my business—the life I’ve made. First, I turn public opinion against the human soldiers returning from the war. Make them think human soldiers are ineffective, and worse—dangerous. The mass shootings are increasing, and people are getting scared.”
“And many innocent people hurt,” she said.
He rose from the sofa, champagne glass clutched in his metal hand. “That can’t be helped. When you create killing machines, there will be mistakes. Civilian lives lost are part of the cost to protect the greater number of people.”
The alcohol had warmed Nancy. Emboldened her. “What for? Why do all this? Why do you want to save the world?”
Vance lingered in front of the window, gazing at the night sky. “I was orphaned as a baby. My mother had been assaulted. She left me on the steps of an orphanage. What she didn’t know was that the place was very bad. There were…unspeakable things that happened to me as a child.”
Vance paused, swigged the remains of his champagne, then poured himself a scotch.
Her mouth twisted. “I’m so sorry that happened. How did you get away?”
“The things I endured…” Vance pushed the jolting memories away. “I killed them all, naturally.” He turned and revealed a flat smile. “It took years to plan, but I killed every one of the people who hurt me.”
She tensed.
“What was I saying before you distracted me? This doctor, this world specialist,” he hissed, “told me I have one, maybe two months left to live before the cancer consumes my body. Before it reaches my brain.”
Was she sorry for him? No, of course not. He was her captor. Yet he sensed pity—or was it relief at his imminent demise?
“And now you know why I’ve gone to such great pains to,” he paused and shed his jacket and shirt, revealing his robotic arms and chest, “transform.”
She studied him, then turned her gaze away.
“Yes, transform. That’s the word I was searching for.” He flexed one arm, admiring his impressive steel biceps. “Like a butterfly emerging from his chrysalis, I have transformed.”
Nancy gulped down the rest of her drink and poured herself another glass.
Vance gazed outside at the evening view again. “Nancy, I’ve come across information that might make all the difference in the world. There’s a healer in our midst. And I don’t have to go to Switzerland for this one. This healer lives in Spark City.”
He stepped back, catching his reflection in the glass. He turned to admire his man-machine physique.
“I’m told she can return the dead to life. Imagine what she can do with me.”
Twenty-Three
The next morning, Ida burst into Dox and found Gatz seated at a table.
Behind the bar, a bartender stood with arms crossed. He took one look at Ida and, without a word, threw on a jacket and left.
“Just brewed a fresh pot of coffee,” Gatz said.
She nodded, and he busied himself preparing two cups. “Probably best to skip the whiskey for now,” he said from behind the bar.
She approached the bar, her jacket still on. She didn’t want to get tricked into staying longer. He had a way of making someone feel…comfortable.
“They’re searching for me,” she said.
He placed her cup in front of her. “Sit. You get straight to the point, don’t you? Cream?”
“Black.”
“Back up. Who is following you?”
>
“The damn police, that’s who. I went to an art show last night. The place started crawling with police droids. They had an image of me. Questioned people. I barely made it out.”
Gatz drummed his fingers on the bar.
She asked, “Do you think they have us on film from the planetarium? Has anyone been here looking for you? You don’t exactly blend into a crowd.”
“No, nobody’s been here. But I’ve taken precautions.”
“What do you mean?”
Approaching the rear of his bar, Gatz pushed a hidden lever, and the entire shelf shifted sideways and disappeared into the wall. In its place stood a cache of weapons—rifles, handguns, knives, machetes, and grenades.
“Holy shit!” she said.
“I’m lying low. I’ve run before, Ida. Spark City is my home now. It’s taken me years to build this bar, years to build my contacts, gather my intelligence. This is my home, and I’m not leaving. I’m staying here and fighting to protect what’s mine. I’ve taken precautions.”
What must it have been like to be forced from your home, to be on the run? She’d never known a real home. “But Gatz, people who stay on the move have a better chance of surviving. That was plain as day when I was in the military. You freeze in place, you die. You move, you live.”
He closed the weapon cabinet and faced her. “The way I see it, being on the run is no way to live. I want to fight back this time. Ida, the police are chasing you, and that means Vance Drem is behind it. He doesn’t play fair, I can tell you.” He paced the floor behind the bar. “There’s something else. About you. I heard information this morning. Rumors of a healer. Word on the street is Vance wants to find you ASAP, and is offering a reward.”
She froze. “The men who followed me…”
“Any idea where that video came from?”
Ida recalled all the people who knew about her. Lucy and Paul, but she didn’t think they would tell anyone. She was becoming certain it wasn’t Gatz. The only possible leak could have been Lucy’s mother. Stupid. She should’ve had words with the woman, tried to scare her into keeping quiet. Too late.
The Rogue Spark series Box Set Page 20