by Isaac Hooke
"But Hoodwink had a reflection when he was a gol," Ari remembered telling Tanner.
"His avatar was created before Jeremy's source entangled the blueprint," Tanner said.
"Okay. But how come I can see myself in those handmirrors you always inject Inside along with us?"
"Those are special mirrors," Tanner said. "I set them to ignore the no-reflect flags assigned to your avatar."
The guy had an excuse for everything. Still, she was glad for those handmirrors, because without them—without a reflection—she'd feel like she had no identity whatsoever. She already felt that way enough as it was, the dual personas and self-image of Inside and Outside constantly vying for control. The strong and fearless Ari of the Inside. The weak and frightened Ari of the Outside. And potentially someone else, beyond that.
Who am I?
In the mirror she saw city guards dash into the transit center and point at her. One shouted.
Ari stepped through the shimmering surface.
White light filled her vision.
Time had no meaning here. Nor did space. She had no body, yet somehow she was still corporeal. She was anchored nowhere, yet everywhere. She floated in a white primeval goo fashioned from the leftovers of the universe, the particulates that remained when the planets and the stars were made, a goo that existed in the spaces between matter.
But it was all simulated.
She was on the Inside, after all.
None of this was real.
Right?
56
What is reality?
A series of lights painted on our irises? A sequence of sounds played out on our ear drums? The touch of a lover? The crisp scent of fresh snow in the morning? The taste of cinnamon-spiced wine? An emotion? A memory?
She had experienced all of these things on the Inside.
And all of them were false. Unreal.
Just like this new city she ventured to. A city she'd never been to in her life. A city she wouldn't really be in, even when she arrived. How could she be, when it was all fake?
And yet if she died here, in this world, she died in the real world, that cold world of steel and golems where her air was slowly running out and the threat of death was even more constant.
Yet Hoodwink lived. He had died in that world, the real world, and he lived. Or so she was told. Tanner believed it. So it must be true.
But it made no sense.
Hoodwink. Father. How can you survive when no one else can? How can you live through death in the real world, when neither I, nor Tanner, nor Marks, poor Marks, can do such a thing?
And are you really my father, Hoodwink?
Tanner had told her a little about the system. Time passed differently on the Inside. She understood that well enough. She even embraced it. But what had her mind in knots was the fact that she would've lived through at least five or six lifetimes by now. Tanner had told her that if you died while connected directly as a gol, you died in the real world. Whereas if you died violently while connected through a pod, you either killed your body in the real world or you woke up, and iron golems would come fetch you either way. But he also told her that when you died of old age on the Inside while in a pod, the system merely reset you, and you were reborn with a body dictated by the DNA of your real-world counterpart, and you kept being reborn until your real-world counterpart died. Each rebirth you were assigned to a random mother and father.
A random father.
When she discovered she'd been revised by Jeremy those ten years ago, all she wanted to do was find her real father. She'd found Hoodwink, or rather he found her, and she felt that her life was complete. And then she lost him.
But it turned out he wasn't her real father anyway.
Tanner said she was conceived in a thin glass tube and grown in the uterus of the pod world. He said "organic" wires were meshed into her brain and spine while she developed, wires that grew with her so that she was one with the machine. So in theory her father was the machine itself—the ship that housed her. The A.I. that ran this place. Her real father and mother would remain forever unknown. The dead bodies of her actual parents provided the eggs and ejaculate, and were stored in a bank and arranged according to something called "genetic" traits. These raw materials that formed her were chosen because they were deemed a perfect match by the A.I., and when combined would produce a child with the best possible traits for long-term survivability in the pod world. What those traits might be, she didn't know. The ability to lie still and sleep your life away while a game played in your head ranked up there as number one, she supposed.
In any case, the inevitable conclusion was, no, it was impossible that Hoodwink was her real father. Her real, actual father and mother were long dead, and the life-producing stuff they left behind was packed away in ice somewhere, ready to produce more of her brothers and sisters, who probably already numbered in the hundreds, if not thousands.
And yet for all of this, to her, Hoodwink was her father.
And that was her reality. That was real to her.
Reality is what you make it, Tanner had told her.
Hoodwink was her father, through and through.
And she missed him, but she knew he would return. When, she didn't know. How could she? Not even Tanner knew what Topside meant. I have to go Topside anyway, Hoodwink had told her before he died. She still saw the glass breaking outward. She still saw Hoodwink getting sucked into space, his body floating, receding into the distance.
Gone Topside.
Would she ever find out what Topside meant? Would she have to die to find out?
"Hoodwink can come back from death," Tanner had said the other day on the Inside, when she'd been in deep sorrow again, and contemplating the unthinkable. "But you can't come back."
"Why can't I?" she said. "Why?"
Tanner sighed deeply. "Ari. I don't know. I wish I did. I wish there was a way. But you have to wait. Trust me. How he can do it, and why you or anyone else can't, I don't know. Hoodwink never told me. He never told any of us. That he hasn't told his own daughter should tell you something."
"He didn't have time!" She knew Hoodwink would have told her. Eventually.
But he died.
Gone Topside.
Ari emerged from the portal into a vaulted transit center that looked very much like the one she'd just left, with similar roped-off lines leading away from each portal. There were no guards waiting for her. That was good, to a degree. The mayors operated independently of one another, but if Jeremy had contacted the mayor of Dhenn and cast her as a wanted terrorist, there could be men headed to the transit center to arrest her at that very moment.
She nervously followed the other transitioners who'd emerged moments before her. They had arrived from cities all over the world. She wasn't exactly sure what routing mechanism the portals used to ensure only one person came out a certain portal at a certain time, though she'd heard horror stories of people materializing with their bodies mashed together—the heads of other transitioners jutting from their chests, genitals from their armpits, hands from their faces. Terrible rumors, though in truth she'd never seen anything like that, nor anyone with a head jutting from his or her chest, though she supposed such a person wouldn't survive long.
Ahead of her, four people in different groups abruptly collapsed dead at the same time.
57
Ari remained calm during the ensuing panic.
It was The Drop.
It reminded her of the terrible situation on the Outside, a situation that was only getting worse. An attack had destroyed some of the pods just now, killing the sleepers who existed on the Outside, along with their representations in this world. She did her best to ignore the anguished sobs of the bereaved, knowing all too well what it felt like to lose someone important to you.
After some moments security guards restored order—most of them were human conscripts, she noted—and the bodies were dragged to the side. The line proceeded once more.
Th
e gol behind the customs desk was slobbering, and waved her past with barely a look, as it did every transitioner. She could have passed through if she'd been trying to smuggle snortroot.
She stepped from the transit center onto a height that overlooked a vast, snowless cavern. The Dhenn cave city. In the main cavern below, which extended at least two or three miles distant, giant stalagmites towered from the floor, paired with stalactites reaching down from the ceiling. The overall effect was rather unsettling, just as if a giant maw were closing on the place.
Most of the stalagmites in that vast cavern had been hollowed out for the residents, the insides filled with streets and byways and houses and shops, and she could see tiny lights dotting the surfaces. Other tunnels broke away from the main cavern and led away to the various sections and subsections of Dhenn.
She walked down steps carved into the rock. Though there was no snow, which was a nice change, the air was still cold and her breath misted. I'm a gol, she reminded herself. I can ignore the cold. Torches were set in brackets at intervals along the cave wall. She reached the main street—a meandering path through the giant stalagmites. Globes of light lit the way. Magic, she would have thought in times past, when she didn't know the truth. When she didn't know that anything was possible when you grew wires into your brain, connected an umbilical to your spine and plugged yourself into a machine.
There were a few buskers about, banging out tunes on cymbals and lutes. An olive-skinned foreigner tried to sell her salted meat. "Best meat. Very good, very good." Squatting beside the entrance to a stalagmite that held a street which curved up and out of sight, a withered boy extended a palm, not raising his head. She placed ten drachmae in the boy's hand and curled her fingers around his. He looked up and smiled.
So this was Dhenn. There were a few other cities she could have visited to obtain what she needed. But Dhenn was only one portal-hop away, so it made the most sense. She'd asked Tanner why he couldn't just create what was needed. She'd angrily told him, "You can make fire swords but you can't do this?" He'd explained that it had to do with not having the source again.
So the plan required that she come here and procure the necessary concoction. The New Users had wanted to send someone in her place, but she refused to risk anyone else's life. Besides, she was more than capable of completing this task, despite the dangers.
Her boots echoed from the bare rock, and she almost missed the comforting crunch of snowpack. Almost. She'd seen what a sunny, snowless day could look like, seen it in the glimpse of the past Tanner had shown her. If sunny days invited conquerors and destruction like that, she preferred the snow thank you very much.
The directions Jacob of the New Users had given were as follows—seek Watership Street just past the Black Market. Knock on the fourteenth door, the one with the mortar and pestle symbol hanging above. Ask for Merry-Death.
Ari pulled up the city map in her head, using the gol trick Tanner had taught her, and she found the necessary streets and byways easily enough. Soon she found herself in a wide square hemmed in by smaller stalagmites and jam-packed with activity. Black Market. Wary of thieves, she clung tightly to the satchel slung over her shoulder.
She walked past vendors offering snortroot, imitation goods, and crank-loaded crossbows. Illicit wares, all of them. The pungent scent of skunk weed mingled with the stench of sweat and feces in the air.
She left the market, and passed from the main cavern and into one of the many side passageways carved into the mountain. The tunnel opened into a smaller cavern, where stalagmites roughly half the size of those in the main cave sprung from the floor. She went to the giant stalagmite labeled Watership Street and ducked inside.
A spiraling street had been carved inside the stalagmite, and she followed the ramp upward. A ditch that stank of sewage carved a runnel along the floor near the wall, though the gentle flow of water—ice melt maybe—kept the runnels clear. Wooden doors were set at intervals in the winding passageway.
When she came to the door that matched the description Jacob had given her, she knocked. On the sign, a happy face was drawn over the mortar, and the pestle was distinctly phallic-like, suggestively placed above two smaller cloves of garlic.
The door opened and a middle-age woman appeared, stiff of face and back. "Can I help ye?"
"Is Merry-Death in?" Ari said.
"Blessy-help ye!" The woman said. "Surely you mean Meredith, lass?"
"Sorry, yes Meredith," Ari said, reddening.
"Well a wee bit late you are today, lass, we was just about to close. But come on in! The Merry Pestle's always open to entertaining new customers, no matter the hour, no matter the need!" The woman opened the door wider and beckoned her inside. "Come now, don't be shy! Even ladies need an aphrodisiac now and then, especially when the man is a dead bat in the sack! I'm Bethy by the way."
"Ari." She followed Bethy inside a room carved into the stone.
The woman closed the door behind her, and shouted into a side chamber. "Up with you mama! We's gots ourselves a customer, we do!" She smiled at Ari. She had three gaps in her front teeth.
Ari bit back her unease, and smiled back.
An old woman hobbled inside, hunched over a cane, massaging her lower back with a skeletal hand. That nose reminded Ari of a hawk's beak, and there was a small hairy growth near the tip. Her chin was long, so that nose and chin together resembled pincers when viewed in profile. The old woman wore a black robe, with the hood raised, though the fringe covered only about half her head so that her white hair spilled out in profusion.
Despite the old woman's somewhat unsettling appearance, Ari felt immediate empathy for her. She herself had been an old woman not so long ago. Her eyes fell to the bronze bitch at the woman's neck. This woman had aged naturally, at least. Everyone did, when they were collared.
"How can I help you?" the old woman said, the air whistling between teeth that had even more gaps than the daughter's. Her hands shook with palsy.
Ari stared into those ancient, watery eyes. One eye bulged, while the other permanently squinted. Still, there was intelligence in them. Shrewdness. "Meredith?"
"Aye." The old woman regarded her suspiciously.
Time to see if Jacob was right. "I heard you can make me a White Poultice."
The old woman's hands stopped shaking. She didn't breathe. She didn't blink.
Possession of the White Poultice was punishable by death. You could be arrested just for asking around for the stuff. Those who made it had to be very selective about their customers. Ari wished she'd brought her sword along, though Jacob had advised against it.
"I can pay you a handsome sum," Ari said.
Still no answer.
Ari glanced at the daughter. Bethy stood at the far side of the room, behind a shelf filled to the brim with various jars and containers. Bethy held a hand-crossbow at eye-level, and she had it aimed between the jars at Ari.
58
Ari slowly raised her hands in surrender.
Meredith smiled suddenly. "I'm sorry, we're closed lass."
"Four hundred drachmae," Ari said.
Meredith edged past her to the door.
"A thousand," Ari said.
Meredith opened the door.
"Five thousand drachmae," Ari said.
Meredith closed the door, and returned, hunching, until her face was practically nose-to-nose with Ari's. The old woman exhaled, and a blast of garlic filled Ari's nostrils. She did her very best not to flinch.
Meredith narrowed those mismatched eyes. "What interest does a gol have in White Poultice?"
Ari had a hard time hiding her shock. She hadn't opened her cloak to reveal the numbers on her chest, yet Meredith somehow knew what she was.
"Oh yes, I know you're a gol," Meredith said. "You're features are far too perfect to belong to any human, despite the fake collar you wear. So I ask again, what interest does a gol have in White Poultice?"
"What's an apothecary doing selling it?" Ari shot back.
"I never said I had it." Meredith turned away, all nonchalance, and shuffled over to her daughter. The old woman's gaze swiveled to the hand-crossbow. "With a word, just a word, lassy, I can have you curled up on the floor, vomiting your insides like there was no tomorrow. Gol or human, the poison works the same. Fast. Deadly. Just a scratch is all it takes."
Ari had nothing to say to that, so she merely returned that gaze defiantly. The two stared each other down for what seemed long moments. Ari's gaze drifted to the poisoned hand-crossbow.
Finally the old woman scowled. "Six thousand drachmae, no less."
"Done," Ari said. "Now put that crossbow away and make me the White."
"No need. Have some already prepared. And the crossbow stays." Meredith reached high up, nearly losing her balance. She dropped her cane and had to grab onto her daughter for balance.
"Mother!" Bethy swayed, and pressed the trigger. Ari felt the cool brush of air as the bolt whished past her cheek, a little too close for comfort. It hit the wall with a thud behind her.
Meredith glanced at Ari sheepishly. "Sorry."
Bethy shoved her mother away and loaded another bolt. Keeping the crossbow aimed at Ari, Bethy knelt and returned the cane to her mother.
Meredith retrieved a glass jar containing a thick white salve from the shelf just below the topmost. "This here is the most potent White you'll ever find, it is. Nothing like it in all the cities of the world. My recipe is especially concentrated. You're looking at the extracts of over three hundred snowroots. Be very careful with this, lass. But a little caveat for you—though it's powerful stuff, there's only enough for three applications, no more."
"Perfect." Ari accepted the jar. "Thank you." She examined the contents. She held the jar motionless, but the white substance inside oozed back and forth as if it were alive. Perhaps some insect housed within. Suppressing a shiver, she stashed the jar in her shoulder satchel.
The old woman turned away.