by Beth Revis
The androids didn’t think when they lifted the dome. They don’t have a brain. They have a computer. They just followed directions. And that killed the entire colony.
At least, that’s what happened if what Representative Belles is telling me is true. Which, honestly, I’m not sure how much I can trust him, or why he’s telling me this.
Representative Belles stands up, and for a moment, I think he’s going to come around the desk and do something to me. I flinch as he turns on his heel, but then he strides toward the window, not me. I stand up and move closer, gazing down. The Representative has a perfect view of the plaza, the fountain. From here I can see it all, the dark uniforms of security, the hurried walking of businessmen and women, the street androids idly serving customers pastizzi and other snacks.
I’m losing him. Whatever made him talk about science and terrorists before—that’s all gone away. He’s clamming up. But I try one more question: “What does the lunar colony tragedy have to do with the terrorists the government is trying to stop?” I ask, my voice low.
“Maybe it doesn’t have anything at all to do with the terrorists,” Representative Belles says as he looks down at the plaza.
I examine his face in the reflection of the glass. He doesn’t look like a man who’s contemplating treason.
He looks terrified.
twenty-four
I step out into the sunlight, momentarily blinded.
Well, this day has officially been the strangest day of my life.
Only one thing left to do now. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a street android selling warm, delicious-smelling pastizzi. I may have spent the morning tracking down a lunatic thanks to a holographic image of my dad, hallucinated, and wound up in a potential terrorist’s office where I had a super weird conversation, but at least pastizzi are normal.
“Cheese,” I say when I reach the front of the line. I tap my cuff against the payment center and wait for the android to hand me the ricotta-filled pastizza.
The android doesn’t move.
“One. Cheese,” I say again, enunciating clearly. My cuff flashes that my payment was accepted.
“Tranquility through freedom,” the android says.
“Excuse me?” I ask. I glance around. There are a few other street androids near the fountain, and all of them seem to have frozen. Their customers look just as confused as me.
“TRANQUILITY THROUGH FREEDOM,” the street android bellows. Its voice goes up a notch. “Tranquility through freedom! Tranquility through freedom!” it chants.
I back away slowly, dread rising up in my throat.
“The hell is going on?” a man in a business suit asks behind me.
“I have no idea,” I mutter. I try to hold the man back, but he shakes me off. “Something’s wrong,” I say. “We should get help.” Out of the corner of my eye, I see that several black uniforms are marching toward us and all the other street androids in the plaza.
The man jerks his arm free and shrugs past me. “No!” I shout. “Stay back!”
He ignores me and grabs the android by the shoulders, as if shaking it will make it work. My feet work of their own volition—I keep backing away, my eyes wide, sure something bad is about to happen. The security is swarming around, but there are more androids than they can handle, and the crowd turns into a mob.
I make it to the gate before I hear the first explosion.
I turn around, my eyes drinking up the horror before me. At least a dozen spots on the plaza are smoking, smoldering chunks of twisted metal. All of the androids exploded. The people nearby… I stare with horror at the spot where I stood with the man in the business suit. All that’s left now are red stains on a white shirt, the tattered edges of a dark sleeve, a foot, and, several meters away, another foot. It’s like seeing Akilah die earlier, except without the trappings of war. This is every nightmare I’ve ever had rolled into one: war invading my own home.
“Oh, God,” I mutter, staring at the massacre. The black-uniformed security and military people rush forward, trying to stem the flow of chaos. My cuffLINK starts flashing red and a warning message zooms across the screen.
Android malfunction leads to several deaths in Triumph Plaza, Central Gardens, Comino Island, and other areas of New Venice. Citizens should return to their homes. Any androids within the area should be immediately disabled.
My heart sinks, boiling in the acid of my stomach. “Mom,” I gasp. Mom. And her new nursing android. I left Mom this morning with a walking, talking bomb.
I turn on my heel and race through Central Gardens, pushing past the crowds. A definite sense of pure panic rises throughout the city, encompassing it like a tsunami. New Venice has never been attacked before, not like this, not from within.
My fingers skim across my cuff as I run, and I bring up the latest news. The news team must have been ordered to repeat the same message over and over on a loop.
“—no reasoning behind the android malfunction that’s led to dozens, perhaps hundreds of injuries and deaths. Sources say Prime Administrator Young did give the command to remotely disconnect all androids operating within New Venice, but the remote kill switch is currently inoperable and countless androids remain online. All citizens are advised to manually disable any android in the area. If the android already appears to be malfunctioning, all citizens are advised to immediately take cover as far away as possible.”
Mom can’t move fast, not fast enough to out-distance an exploding android.
I blink and turn the news off, pushing myself even further toward Reverie and home and Mom. I try to message Mom, but she’s not answering. Ms. White’s cuff must be out of reception, somehow, or turned off—none of my messages to her even go through.
When I reach the south gate of Central Gardens, I pass by a group of military elite, guns already out, racing toward the park. Comino Island, a part of the lower city, was also attacked. I think about the children that go to the theme park there. Androids are often teachers’ aides. Many use them for nannies or babysitters, even though there are warnings on their labels that children shouldn’t be left with androids unsupervised.
How many children were among the deaths? I almost stumble at the thought.
I have to wait to cross the street, ambulances and police cars racing by. The glass front of Reverie is pristine and clear, the neon sheep bouncing across the surface as if nothing at all were wrong. I cringe, waiting for an explosion, half expecting it to happen right here and now in front of me. I close my eyes, trying to stay calm, but all I see behind my eyelids is the glass front shattering, people screaming, running from the building… and Mom. Mom, who named her android, turned to dust and ash, mangled bits of unrecognizable flesh.
As soon as the street is clear, I race across it, sliding through the glass doors of Reverie before they’re open all the way. The waiting lobby is empty, sterile, with soft scents and quiet music playing gently. No sign of the chaos outside, no sign of the destruction awaiting upstairs. My breath is jagged and uneven, my footsteps loud. It sounds weird here, where the white tile and serene mood lighting makes everything peaceful. I visualize the serenity torn apart by an exploding bomb, screams cutting through the soft music.
I don’t wait for the lift. No time. I take the stairs two at a time, my heart thumping and my lungs screaming for air. I throw myself into the apartment, screaming for Mom as the door slides open. Mom is in the kitchen and struggling to stand, concern etched on her face at my sudden and loud appearance.
“What’s wrong?” she asks me, weakly.
I don’t answer. I look wildly around. The android Mom named Rosie. Standing in front of the interface screen in the living room, past the kitchen. I lunge around a dining room chair and skid into the living room. Rosie doesn’t even acknowledge my presence. The interface screen is open to Reverie’s private network, the most secure parts, where Mom’s research and the science behind reveries lie. Not even Ms. White has access to these files, just me and Mom. Rosie’s
not even programmed to go onto the interface, much less hack our system.
Son of a—! “Interface off,” I command loudly. “Lock screen authorization Ella Shepherd.” The screen goes black.
The android slowly straightens. It twists its body, turning its face to me. Its dead, empty eyes stare into mine. Its face is expressionless, as if all the programming to make it appear human has already been deleted.
Rosie’s mouth drops open, a movement that is so robotic it breaks any illusion of humanity that could ever be attributed to the machine. Its head cocks a little to the left.
“What’s wrong, Ella?” Mom asks again.
“Tranquility through freedom,” Rosie mutters, so soft I almost don’t catch it.
“Shit,” I say.
I spin around to Mom. “Get out!” I scream at her. “We have to go! Rosie’s going to explode!”
“What?” Mom asks. She’s disorientated. She can’t handle this stress, this panic. Her body is always just a shock away from collapsing. Her fingers grip the edge of the table, knuckles white. Her face is pale.
“Tranquility through freedom,” Rosie says, louder. “TRANQUILITY THROUGH FREEDOM.”
There’s no way we can escape in time.
A low buzzing sound emits from the back of Rosie’s throat. The same “ZnznznZNznzn” sound that I heard from the other android, seconds before…
I dive for Mom and pick her up, wrapping my arms around her waist and lifting her across my shoulder. “Ella!” she says, breathless and choking on a cough. I don’t answer. I run for her bedroom. The building is new, but even though the Secessionary War was a generation ago, nearly every building built since then has at least one special room.
A panic room. And that’s the room Mom uses as a bedroom.
As soon as we’re through the door, I put Mom down. Her legs give way under her and she collapses on the floor, but I can’t stop to help her. I turn around, slamming my cuff painfully against the scanner by the door. The door snaps shut, and I type in the panic code. I can hear the steel bolts shooting through the heavy metal door seconds before the explosion goes off.
twenty-five
I sink to the ground, my back to the steel door protecting us. My entire body is trembling, a strange, personal aftershock of the explosion. Even though the panic room is solid and sealed tight, I imagine that I can smell smoke. The idea of it sickens me.
“Mom?” I ask.
Mom doesn’t lift her head from where I dropped her on the floor, but her eyes look up to meet mine. “What happened?” she asks weakly.
“I don’t know,” I say. “Rosie blew up.”
I get back up and then help her to stand. Together, we move slowly to her bed. I hook her cuff into the health monitors. Everything’s off the charts—her heart, her breathing, her neurons. I quickly schedule an appointment with a Dr. Simpa, Mom’s latest physician.
Then I pick up Mom’s sleeping pills.
Mom grips my hand. “Ella, don’t—” she says. “Let me stay awake. Maybe I can… help…”
But I give her a double dose of sedatives anyway, and I watch as her eyes close in just a few moments. “Get restful and tranquil sleep with our special blend of morphine and melanin!” the label on the bottle of mopheme reads. I rub my thumb over that word: tranquil.
Tranquility through freedom!
I open the panic room door.
The first thing I notice is the smell. Acrid, burning. It’s a sharp odor that makes me want to flinch away. But I cover my nose and mouth with my arm and creep forward.
The entire interface window is gone. The glass and the wall framing it—nothing but a jagged, gaping hole. A gentle breeze wafts up, cutting through the burning rubble.
The floor from the kitchen to the where the interface room used to be is blackened and charred, with pock marks made from debris, and a long, stretching series of blast marks.
Rosie the android is nothing but bits of rubberized synthetic flesh, burning circuitry, and barely recognizable pieces.
I have no emotions. I just stand there, in the rubble of my life.
This… this was my home. If it were a person, this would be a gaping chest wound, the kind no one can recover from.
The door slides open and Ms. White bursts inside. She makes a little mewling cry, and rushes for me.
“Your mother?” she asks when she finally releases me from the hug.
“She’s sleeping,” I say. “I gave her mopheme. The steel walls in her bedroom—that’s what saved us.”
Ms. White holds me out at arms’ length, not willing to let me go. “Oh, you smart, brilliant girl,” she says, pulling me in closer and kissing my forehead. Then she pushes me away, examining my face. “Us?” she repeats. “You were here with Rose? I thought you were in Representative Belles’s office?”
I shake my head. “I ran here as soon as I saw the androids blow in the plaza.”
A tableau of emotion flitters across Ms. White’s face, and I cannot read her expression. She swallows, hard. “Oh, Ella,” she whispers. “What if you hadn’t been here for her?”
My eyes are open and wide, staring at the blast pattern burnt into the floor behind Ms. White. Mom wasn’t that far from Rosie, and she was already weak.
A blast like that would have killed her.
Like it killed Akilah.
The shock of the thought surprises me so much that I jerk back, making Ms. White watch me with concern. I don’t know what happened to my best friend, whether she died or not, or whether the person I’ve been talking to for the past year is even the same friend I grew up with.
All I know for sure right now is that Mom almost died.
Ms. White straightens, her gaze never breaking from mine. I can see her jawline go taut, and she nods emphatically, even though neither of us has said anything. “Right,” she says. “I’m going to contact some construction workers right away—if they can’t fix the hole, they can at least make it safe for you to stay here. Unless you’d rather…?”
“I’m not leaving Mom,” I say.
“No, I meant—well, you could stay with me. And your mother… maybe she should go to the hospital… No, not the hospital. It’ll be crazy right now, best not to expose your mother to that. I can call Dr. Simpa, arrange a special visit in his private labs…”
“We’re not leaving,” I say again. “And I’ve already gotten Mom an appointment with Dr. Simpa.”
“I’ll arrange for a nurse to come. A real one,” she adds when she sees my look. “No more androids.”
“Who did this?” I say. For the first time, there’s emotion in my voice. “Was it the terrorists?” Or was it Jack Tyler? I almost ask, but the words don’t form in my mouth.
Ms. White frowns. “It seems likely.”
“‘Tranquility through freedom.’ That’s what Rosie said before she blew. Could this have something to do with the Tranquilitatis disaster?” I don’t know if I would have made the connection if Representative Belles hadn’t brought it up earlier, but it seems far too much of a coincidence to just be chance.
Ms. White’s eyes widen slightly. “Have you seen the news already?” she asks.
I shake my head silently, my hand already going to my cuff to bring up the reports.
Ms. White stops me. “PA Young announced that the terrorists might have roots in the lunar colonies, perhaps even traitors from the lunar base. She’s had investigators studying the old Tranquilitatis disaster, and she believes that this attack was instigated by the same group of terrorists who caused the deaths of the colonists all those years ago.”
I drop my hands and take a step back, surprised at this.
“What?” Ms. White asks, concern etched in her voice.
“I was with Representative Belles just before the attack,” I say, even though I know she knows this. “And he mentioned the disaster. Said it was an accident caused by androids.”
Ms. White narrows her eyes. “I’ll let PA Young know he said that. It’s very suspicio
us he’d be talking about it now, just before the attack…”
I nod, agreeing with her.
“It could be that Belles has already joined the terrorists. Maybe lies like that are what convinced him to join their side.”
“Maybe,” I say slowly, remembering the way the representative looked so scared.
Ms. White sighs, sinking into a chair at the table. “Who knows, really? This could have just been a stunt to distract the government from a bigger problem, or—”
“It was more than a stunt!” I roar, my voice rising far louder than I intended. Rather than be surprised by my volume, though, Ms. White’s face melts with sympathy and emotion.
“You’re right,” she says simply. “This is war.”
twenty-six
While Ms. White helps set up a new—human—nurse with Mom, I retreat to my bedroom, bringing up the news before I collapse onto my bed. Dozens of programs on the android attack pop up in my vision, but they tell me nothing that I haven’t already heard or guessed—a terrorist attack from an unknown group. The only thing I didn’t know before was the exact number: 104. One hundred and four people dead. Mostly government officials, but one child, aged eight, who had accompanied her mother to Triumph Towers, in order to meet the Prime Administrator as an award for an art contest.
One hundred and four.
I take a shaky breath and silence the news for a moment. “Search: reasons behind android explosion attack,” I say, and my vision blurs as the cuff sends the information to my eyes. A moment later, a semi-circle of floating boxes surrounds my head—or at least, it feels that way. I focus on different boxes, reading text and listening to reports, but everything is speculation, and it’s all far too weak.
Maybe there aren’t any answers. Maybe there never are.
Most of the news reverts back to PA Young’s speech about the possibility of the terrorism reaching as far back as the Tranquilitatis Disaster so long ago. When I try to research the failed colony, nearly everything I read has already been altered to include the new information.