by J P Waters
“Weird. Where’d they get off to?”
Olie began searching the building for the missing droids, and before long she rounded a corner to find a droid that had powered down. The SeaCrest droids were an older model—humanoid by design and composed mostly of high-grade plastics. This one was slumped over, with its gray arms hanging as if performing a half-hearted side bend.
“Damn it,” Olie said with a frown. It was usual for the droids to run out of power from time to time, but it would take a vice hauler and several employees to get the droid back to the charging station, and that was a slow, exhausting production. And it looked as though this was only the first. There were at least three others somewhere in the building, assuming the night-shift worker hadn’t returned them to their charger either.
As she examined the powerless droid, Olie thought she heard something behind her. She turned quickly to see if someone had come into the building. She stared for a moment, waiting to see if the noise would return. When it didn’t, she turned her attention back to the powerless droid.
When she was certain that the droid had exhausted all of its reserve, she cursed again and moved on. She found a second droid standing idly before a control panel between two intake pipes. Same story, and she was starting to get concerned. The droids being out of position was strange enough, but now she was worried about the night tech as well.
Electric engines hummed, and the lights flickered overhead as Olie made her way back down the intake pipes. She moved past the technician’s office and saw something out of the corner of her eye. At first, she thought it might be the third droid that had somehow fallen over, but upon second glance she recognized the gray overalls of Leon, a fellow SeaCrest tech.
She rushed ahead but slowed just a few steps away from Leon’s slumped body. Edging forward, she called out with a quiver in her voice.
“Leon?”
There was no answer, and when Olie knelt her fears were confirmed. Leon lay on his stomach with one arm stretched across the floor and the other tucked beneath him. She rolled him over and took a few quick steps back with a gasp.
Leon was ashen; his stomach bored open. The aged AI tech was hollowed out—sucked dry. There was some blood on the building floor, but not nearly as much as she would have expected for a wound that size.
"No. No, no, no…”
Olie backed away slowly before hurrying out of the building. She sprinted between Building 7 and 8, shouting into her band. Dim's face appeared on her screen.
“What’s the matter?” he asked.
“Leon,” she said, her chest heaving. “Leon’s dead.”
“What?”
“The killer got him,” she barely choked out.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure! Shit, Dim, he was hollowed out, it was awful!”
“Okay, okay,” he said, a seriousness entering his tone. “You stay there. I’ll call security and go check it out.”
“You can’t go in there alone.”
“I’ll be fine. You just stay put.”
Dim ended the call, leaving Olie in silence. She remembered that the next shift was starting soon. Olie began to pace, conflicted between waiting for Dim’s call and wanting to warn her co-workers about entering the building.
Almost immediately, Dim called back.
“I’m so sorry you had to see this. I wouldn’t call it mummification, but… this, this is bad.”
Olie was silent, still processing the latest in a string of horrors.
“Olie? Did you hear me?”
Hearing her own name snapped Olie out of her thoughts. “Yes. Yes, I heard you,” she quietly replied.
“Where are you?”
“The passage between 7 and 8.”
“Stay there. I’m on my way.”
Olie nodded, Dim’s visage blinking out yet again.
Olie had managed to move out of the center of the path and lean on the metal tubing against the wall by the time Dim arrived. Still, she was visibly shaken.
“Hey,” Dim said. “You’re okay. It’s going to be okay.”
“Not for Leon.”
“No. But you’re okay. Right?”
Olie looked at him. “Yeah, I am. How the fuck are you so calm about this?”
“I’m not calm, but Leons’s one of our own. I need to get in there and see to him.”
The pair turned to see a security vehicle speeding in their direction. It was about time. Looking back at Olie, Dim said, “If you want, I can handle the talking.”
“Yeah… thanks.”
Olie then excused herself to the lavatory, where she locked herself in and fell to the floor.
Chapter Nine
Olie had to talk to Security eventually, of course, and to the police as well. It was late in the afternoon before she was finally able to leave work. She put her motorcycle into self-driving mode and let it carry her home. There was no way she would risk steering in that state. Olie had never seen so much death, and she’d come from the military. Even if she’d been on the battlefield, though, she doubted she would have witnessed anything like the horror of Leon’s death. He had been completely emptied out—his skin and bones reduced to a shell. It wasn’t just gruesome, it was terrifying.
Against her better judgement, Olie called Jayson. As complicated as things were with him, she hated the idea of being alone with her thoughts more.
The more she thought about Leon’s demise, the sicker she felt. Eventually she popped the door open and moved from the kitchen to the bathroom. Jayson entered to the sound of her retching in the next room.
“Olie, I let myself in! Are you okay in there?
After a series of coughs and another dry heave she replied, “I’m okay. Just… gimme a minute.”
Eventually she emerged to find Jayson sitting in the living room. He rose at her entrance, and Olie couldn’t help but accept his hug. She felt empty of all emotion and needed the reassurance of an embrace.
“Are you taking a few days off?”
“They said to take as long as I want.”
Jayson nodded and took a tube of SeaCrest water out of the cold unit in the kitchen. After pouring it into a glass, he handed it to Olie.
“Here. You need this. You just lost a lot of fluids.”
Olie rushed back to the bathroom to retch again and returned a few minutes later.
“Sorry,” Jayson said. “Poor choice of words.”
“It’s okay.”
“Okay.”
The two sat in silence for a while, their attention naturally shifting to the unknown creature in the kitchen’s corner.
“I think he’s getting bigger.”
“How much bigger?”
“I dunno. Just a little. Maybe he’s a baby.”
Jayson stood to try and evaluate the size of the creature inside the glass jar. “How long do you plan to keep this thing?”
“I don’t know. Do you have any ideas of what to do with him?”
“Not if you still don’t want to turn it in to the feds.”
The silence returned. Turning his gaze back to Olie, he noticed her artificially sealed finger.
“What’d you do?”
“I cut myself.”
“You’re lying. I can tell, Olie.”
“I’m not lying.”
“I know you are. Your left eye always wanders when you do.”
“My left eye doesn’t wander.”
“It does when you’re lying.”
Olie looked at the animal. She didn’t want to worry him, but Jayson wouldn’t let things go when he got like this.
“Gerry bit me.”
“What?”
“It wasn’t his fault. I put my hand in the jar while he was eating.”
“How deep is the cut?”
Olie shrugged. “Not very. More just a lot of little ones all at once. He must have rows of teeth.”
“Olie, you can’t keep this thing in your house!”
“It’s not a problem. Wat
ch.” Olie leaned forward and removed the glass top.
“Hey! Stop! You just said it’s dangerous!”
Olie reached inside before Jayson could stop her and pulled the balled-up creature out of the jar. She stroked the animal’s fur for a moment before Gerry reached with his forelimb, seemingly searching the air, and slowly unfurled. He seemed much calmer than before.
“It was just because I was feeding him. He got confused about what his food was. He probably can’t see well out of that one eye.”
“So, you’re saying that you smell like food to it. Is that supposed to be comforting?”
“No. It was an accident. He was just a little worked up.”
Jayson sighed. “Olie, it’s like you said. Gerry might be really important. For science, for environmental studies. It could be one of a kind. Or lead us to more. You can’t grow attached to it like this.”
“Oh wow, I’m the one with attachment issues.”
“That’s low, Olie. You invited me here.”
“I know. I’m… I’m sorry. This is all just so much.”
Jayson paused. “Do you want to talk about today?”
“I don’t know.”
“The adnews is saying it’s a serial killer.”
“It might be.”
“We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want.”
“No, I think I need to. To get it out of my system, you know,” Olie said, letting Jayson put a reassuring hand on her own. “I’ve been trying to work through it all day. I’ve never seen this much death before. These many bodies. I never even saw Dad or Ursula’s bodies, they were both cremated before I buried them...”
“Hey, anyone would have trouble with this. It’s completely normal.”
“But I hate it.”
“The incidents?”
“All of it. Death. I hate death.”
Olie rested her head on Jayson’s shoulder. She was beyond caring about muddying the waters. She needed someone to lean on. He put his arm around her back, holding her close as her tears soaked into the fabric of his jacket.
“Thank you for coming over,” she muttered into his arm. “I know how busy you are.”
“Of course. I care about you. And I want to be here for you.”
He started rubbing her back, and suddenly all Olie wanted was a kiss. Something to distract her from the darkness. Something easy and good.
Olie looked up to Jayson and he leaned down, clearly reading her intent. They kissed deeply for a moment before Jayson stopped.
“Are you sure about this?”
“No. Not really.” But she leaned in again.
Between kisses, Jayson said, “Olie, I…”
“Just be quiet, Jay.” This felt good. This was what she needed, and she wanted more. She started unbuttoning his shirt, and he didn’t stop her.
“I haven’t been with anyone else since, you know.”
“Jayson, just stop talking.”
“Really, I haven’t.” Jayson added.
“Not even Mona?”
“What?” Jayson said, quickly backing off. Olie immediately regretted having brought it up.
“I mean, not that there’s anything wrong with it. I just assumed…”
“Assumed what?”
“That you’re—”
“Fucking? Fucking my Seba?”
“Well, yeah. I know how hard this has been for you. Hard for both of us.”
“Oh wow. You think that because you dumped me, I would go and buy a sex robot? She’s a business expense, Olie! She’s my assistant!”
“I tried asking her about it, but she—”
“And you’ve been asking her about my sex life?! Olie? What the fuck?” Jayson stood up and buttoned his shirt back up.
“I thought maybe it’d helped you move on.”
“Moving on? Moving on! I’m not the one who’s moving on. You are! I don’t want to move on. Don’t you see that?”
Olie didn’t respond.
“I need to go. I just… it’s too hard, Olie.”
“Please just stay. I’m sorry I brought up Mona."
“Sorry Olie, I can’t.”
Jayson began walking to the door. His anger faded momentarily, and he asked, “Are you gonna be okay tonight?”
Olie nodded. “Yeah. I’ll be fine.”
And with that he was gone, leaving Olie alone with Gerry and her regret.
Chapter Ten
Olie stopped abruptly during her morning run the next day. Breathing heavily, she pulled off her hood and stood on the sand, surveying the horizon beyond the sea. The sky was just starting to brighten and there was the occasional whitecap visible in the distance as the waves swelled. What had happened with Jayson the night before was only the latest problem in a fast-deteriorating relationship, and she feared it might have been the last straw. As fraught as their relationship had been, though, the thought of completely losing Jayson from her life terrified Olie. So instead of thinking about it she decided to wear herself out.
Turning away from the water, she sprinted down the beach back towards home, running until her lungs burned and her legs felt like pistons. Exhausted, she collapsed into the sand and pounded her fist into it. Jayson was still on her mind.
She had been the one who broke up with Jayson. After her father’s death, Jayson had asked if he was enough to keep her planetside, and she’d said no. But that didn’t mean Olie wanted him out of her life. She thought of the night before and couldn’t help but smile to herself. Those feelings wouldn’t just disappear.
Even worse, lurking behind thoughts of Jayson was the image of Leon… Leon drained of all vitality and mass and emotion. Losing Jayson felt all too real. Anyone could be gone from her life at any time. She’d worked hard to forget that after the deaths in her family. Now it was in the forefront of her thinking all over again.
Back in the apartment’s lift, she watched the sun rise in the east as she rode up to her floor. In that moment, she didn’t particularly care where she wound up. Another conflict zone or under populated colony would have been just fine with her. She just wanted to run away. And without Jayson, there would truly be nothing left for her on Earth.
Well, except for Gerry. Back in her kitchen she watched as Gerry explored his jar like a spider. Maybe she should just let him go. Humans had destroyed enough life on Earth already—maybe leaving him well enough alone was the environmentally responsible thing to do. But if he was as rare as Mona suggested, he might not survive in the wild. He might have been lucky to have made it to shore in the first place, from whatever deep-sea home he had.
Olie didn’t leave the apartment again that day, even though her choice of dehydrated food had become limited. Instead she spent the day applying to jobs off-planet. At one point she even considered reenlisting. After hours of avoiding it, she eventually tried extending an olive branch to Jayson over band message, but she got no response. Not even a read receipt. Olie found herself staring at her band, practically willing a message back from him.
“Come on, Jay. Don’t be like this,” she pleaded with her band. Still, no response came through.
Space had always been the plan, and if it hadn’t been for Jayson, she probably never would have come back to Earth in the first place. Did she regret it? She wasn’t sure. Before, she would have said no. But everything had gotten more complicated.
Chapter Eleven
Suddenly there was a knock at the door. Olie hadn’t been expecting company. She was surprised to see Dim’s face on the telesphere.
She approved his entry and
strode towards the entryway, greeting her friend with a hug. “Dim, what are you doing here? Is everything okay?”
“I called and wrote you four times. Each,” Dim replied. It wasn’t often that Olie saw her friend in street clothes—they mostly interacted at work. He was in lightweight pants and a simple, synthetic-linen shirt.
“I got worried when you didn’t answer, Olie.”
“I’m sorry.”
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“Did you get my messages?”
“I might have seen them.”
“But you didn’t read or listen to them?”
“I’m sorry. I’ve been dealing with a lot. I kinda… checked out for a while. Here, take a seat. Do you want some Hard20?”
“No, no, I can’t stay long,” Dim replied, sitting down in a huff. His brow was furrowed in frustration.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize—”
“That people care about you?”
Olie frowned.
“Even my wife’s worried. After I told her what happened and that I couldn’t get a hold of you, Marguerite said I’d better make sure you’re okay.”
“I’m okay.”
“Well, what did you do today besides ignore me?”
“Applied for jobs. Well, tried. It was pretty hard to focus.”
“Yeah.” Dim nodded. He looked around the apartment, noticing it for the first time. “So this is your place, huh? It’s pretty… bare.”
Olie nodded and glanced around. “I like it this way.”
“No, yeah, it’s nice. Simple. Ours is packed to the gills. Kids, you know?”
Olie didn’t know, but she nodded anyways. Growing up, her father had been so neat that anything but a spotless home was unacceptable. It hadn’t been hard for her to adapt to military life and bunk inspections.
“So, when are you going back to work?”
“Next week? I don’t want to stay idle too long. I don’t think it’s good for me. You?”
“Monday,” Dim said. “SeaCrest has offered to let us talk to someone. Did they tell you that?”
“I got an email.”
“Marguerite wants me to do it.”
“You should. Especially if it’s free.”
“You talked to a shrink before?”
“After Ursula died.”
“Did it help?”
“Yeah. I think so.”
Dim nodded solemnly, his eyes drifting to Gerry’s jar. Shit, she hadn’t thought to cover it.
“What is that?”
“Oh, it’s nothing,” Olie replied, moving from the kitchen and blocking Dim’s line of sight.