“I thought . . . I just thought that if we stayed quiet that, that he wouldn’t see you. That you’d figure out something was wrong, you know?”
“So it’s my fault?” I asked.
“No. Let’s not blame . . . it’s just fucked. Everything. It’s hard to even think . . . I mean we might never see . . . anybody again. What are my parents going to do? My dad, he’ll probably . . .”
I was sitting on the bed, but it felt like I was already gone—the bonds and protein structures breaking down, everything coming apart.
“And then there’s everyone at school. Michael. Christopher. They’re all going to think we’re. . . .” He sniffled. “And my sister. She told me before she left for Spain that she—”
“Why don’t you fucking shut up, okay, Ethan? You’re the cockiest fucker in the world until exactly when we need it the most, and then you disintegrate into this babbling, neurotic child and expect that people are going to still respect you coming out of it.” I shook my head and glared. “Remember in football how you’d always flinch before tackling? All that speed and promise just turned into a liability, because Coach couldn’t resist putting you in the game. But you outrun your own oxygen. You get so scared. So, so scared and I didn’t see it because . . . I don’t know. You were the only person around who I knew would do this with me.”
“I’m not scared,” Ethan insisted, smearing tears across his cheek with his right hand.
“Oh, right, I can tell.” I stepped back and put my hands on my head. “Man, I felt like I knew you inside and out . . . until we started doing houses and then it was like, ‘Who’s this guy?’ And then there were the other robberies and it was like, ‘Who’s this guy?’ And the police showing up in the cafeteria. On and on. New Ethan. And it became obvious that before had just been this sorry schtick, like a cardboard cutout of someone with a backbone. And it kills me. Not so much that you’re a little fucking baby, but that I didn’t see it sooner. No, you know what? It’s worse than that because I did see it. Always needing reassurance and making things a joke. Avoiding people like Christopher who disagree with you, which is what scared people do—when they know they might not be able to back it up. They switch out friends. Change the channel. Make the simulation nicer.”
“Okay, why don’t you fuck off, hot shot!” yelled Ethan. “Like you’re not the one who forgot the goddamn PCB, like the most important fucking thing you’re in charge of! And . . . and . . . what kind of person are you, huh, turning on me the second something goes wrong? How fucking admirable is that, huh?”
My neck throbbed and I kept shaking my head. “There’s a big difference, Ethan, between forgetting to do something and deciding to do something. I might forget maybe one time in a thousand, like with the device, but you’d probably make that same decision nine hundred ninety-nine of them.”
“If I’m as bad as you say I am, why am I here right now? Huh?”
I thought about it a few moments and suddenly all my anger disappeared. My voice softened. I was too shaken up and scared to yell anymore and my words started falling aimlessly toward their target. “Because you already tried to go home . . . and that didn’t work,” I said in a whisper.
Ethan was trying to stop crying, but every minute a new little fit would hit him and he’d have to cover his face in his hands. “It, it wasn’t like that. Man. Fuck. It happened so fast . . . I didn’t think he’d see you.”
“Or maybe you thought if he just voice-rec’d me, then I’d take the fall for us, right?”
“No . . . I don’t know. It happened fast, I told you!”
“Well, it’s still happening and it’s going to keep happening,” I said.
“We should get help,” he said, in a resigned, distant voice.
“What? How? Who could we possibly get help from now?
“I feel like there’s got to be someone. Someone that’s good at this kind of stuff.”
“Buddy, the whole point is to keep people from finding us.”
“The point is to keep the cops from finding us,” said Ethan. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, there’s so much to think about, man. So much . . . bullshit. I’m starting to think maybe I wasn’t so crazy before.”
“What are you talking about?”
“When I almost killed myself.”
“That was six months ago,” I snapped. We didn’t have time for this kind of bullshit right now. I needed him to get his head on straight since it was going to take everything we had from both of us if we were going to get through this.
“I almost did it again. I was so close. So close. I didn’t tell you ‘cuz I didn’t want you to think I was nuts.”
“Oh, I think you’re nuts alright.”
“I had the pills bought, the bedsheet ready to go. A whole smorgasbord to pick from. And then . . . and then you wanted to rob more houses and I was like, ‘well, what the fuck do I have to lose.’”
I looked at the clock in the corner of my film reading 2 p.m. If we went right now to give Jaden another shot of the muscle inhibitor/C19 cocktail he wouldn’t wake up until midnight tonight at the earliest. Which was probably when we’d have to move him, because even though we’d deleted most of the data trail of us going over there, it was still Ethan’s ex-half-uncle by marriage, and it was a place the police could conceivably search. The good thing was that it was a big property and, since the shipping container was on the very edge next to a tree line, we could slip in without being seen from the trailer or the road. Another good thing was that Richard was about as pro fourth amendment as they came and if anyone would make a fuss and insist upon a warrant, it’d be him. “Well, that’s great, Ethan, but guess what? I know something we can do that’ll fix everything.”
Ethan looked up at me through cloudy eyes. “What are you talking about?”
“We’ve been invited to a party. The party. In a house that we’d never, ever be able to get into otherwise.”
“What?”
“They’re so rich that we don’t have to clean the place out, just pocket a few things, and we’ll be able to significantly Revise. Massive neural enhancement. Facial augmentation. New identity. All that stuff.”
The sobs slowed and he looked at me through red, tear-streaked eyes. “Whose party?”
At first it hadn’t occurred to me to do this. She was the last person I wanted to rob. The last person I wanted to know I’d robbed her. But there was something inside saying that it was “the only way.” And that I wasn’t going to be the same person anymore after this. I’d be so much smarter. So much more ethical and courageous. And if we got that identity alteration package that Ethan was talking about, I’d be physically unrecognizable, too. So, it wouldn’t actually be me doing it, but a previous, lesser fragment that hadn’t fused with the rest yet. Not yet evolved into the person I’d always wanted to be, and the person who would actually have a chance with her. I just needed a way to get there. “Lena’s.”
“What? How did you meet her?”
“In the park after Chris dropped me off.”
“And you think we can just rob her house after everything that’s happened, with the police looking for us . . . and a bunch of Lawrence kids running around?”
“I haven’t gotten to the best part yet, Ethan. It’s a masquerade ball.”
Ethan was rubbing his face, trying not to sniffle. “I’m not sure I can do this anymore.”
“You’ll be okay.”
“Right . . .”
“Because I’m going to need your help.”
Chapter 44
I rang the doorbell and smiled for the camera, hoping that Lena would remember me. I felt such a strange mixture of feelings to be in this place where I’d always wanted to be, but simultaneously knowing I’d lost something critical, like I’d broken my legs and was pretending I could still run. I felt shapeless and transient, sweating under the strain. A ghost, real to everyone except myself, with all that had happened in the last thirty-six hours seeming like a postlude to something that had al
ready ended.
Nonetheless, my constituent parts were still here, and my heart sank as I waited, worried that she’d been indulging a whim when she’d invited me and now regretted it. While I’d gone to great lengths to Revise, I was still not Revised to the degree they were and my shortcomings might be too obvious; I’d be too out of place. And it’d be painfully awkward and uncomfortable for everyone.
Just as I considered turning away, the door opened and I saw Lena, beaming and sparkling under elaborate chandeliers, her face a shade lighter than her muslin gown.
“Carter! I’m so glad you made it!” she said, reaching across for a hug that eclipsed just before my mind could take a photograph.
“Well, it sounded like fun, and . . .” I looked over her shoulder at the raucous spectacle assembled over the steel and marble. ” . . . And it looks like fun.”
I blushed, furious with myself that, after everything, all I could muster was a pleasantry.
But she replied easily, “Oh, it’s only getting started,” and then gestured at my hand, “but do put your mask on.”
I looked down at the bone-white disguise that I’d stolen along with formalwear thirty minutes ago from a costume shop, before placing it over the nearly invisible contoured mask I already had on.
“Floriet would appreciate tonight because there’s a sliver of beauty in everything and in a masquerade a sliver is the only thing. And you get to live inside it. Now come on, there are so many people I want you to meet,” she said, leading me past two men stationed beside the door.
“Are they security?” I asked.
“It’s a little snobby, I know,” she said, looking almost embarrassed. “But with everything that’s been happening, you can’t just assume things’ll be fine.”
I wondered what she was referring to. The robberies and the chase were big deals, clearly, but none of it was that close to her. And none of it had kept her from going out earlier. “Especially since you seem to be in the habit of inviting strangers from the park.”
“It’s not a habit.”
“Oh, so I’m the only one?” I asked.
“Don’t get so cocky. Since Floriet’s chief tenet is peaceful, sustainable self-actualization, I figure there’s a floor on how bad someone who likes her can be.” She smiled. “Although . . .”
“Although what?”
“It’s a little worrying that I can’t find your socials.”
“So you’ve been checking me out, huh?” I asked, striking a debonair pose, and giving her an oversized wink.
“You are the ‘stranger from the park,’ like you said.”
“Everyone’s a stranger somewhere, Lena,” I said, not believing I’d said her name. And not believing she’d heard me say it. She touched my arm, guiding me through the entryway and into the ballroom, and it felt like everything before had been a dream—and these were the first real steps I’d ever taken.
“You’ll certainly be one tonight. But I think everyone will appreciate a good flourish.”
I was about to ask her what she meant by that, when the whole scale of what was in front of me came into view, more brilliant than I could’ve ever imagined. On the main floor, framed by Romanesque columns and ice sculptures, about forty guests were dancing to a number they all seemed to know, everyone in suits and dresses, moving in crisp, choreographed steps—synchronized with the hits of the orchestra. Beyond them were projections and light murals and tessellated ornaments hanging from the ceiling in celestial orbits, dusted with crops of dry ice lit purple, blue and orange. Hyperreal and exaggerated, like being in a movie.
“Martin, Abigail, come here—I have someone I want you to meet!”
“Oh, is he the one you were talking about? Carter, right? Charming.” And then turning to me, Martin continued in French, “Ah, it’s a pleasure to meet you. Lena was going on and on about this delightful boy she met in the park today, which is exquisite since we thought we’d met all the interesting people left to meet around here.”
I’d meant to learn French. I was learning French, but I hadn’t had time to finish before. My face went hot as I fumbled for words. “Yes, yes. It was a fortunate encounter.”
I hadn’t nailed the accent and both Martin and Lena’s expressions clouded for a second before smoothing back over, Martin seamlessly transitioning to English. But I could tell it was more about not wanting to be rude themselves since, while they stayed smiling, both stiffened slightly and crossed their arms.
“This is a good one to come to, but you should’ve seen the zinger she threw in July. Her parents brought in a menagerie from Southeast Asia. Absolutely stupefying. Tigers, monkeys, snakes, and anything else you can imagine walking around. Except an elephant. There wasn’t an elephant.”
“They were loose inside?” I asked, trying to sound impressed, knowing that I was playing catchup now.
“Well, of course. A couple little tweaks here and there and you keep the beast but lose the bite. Her dad’s a bio-engineer, a world famous one, as I’m sure you’re aware, so it’s all par for the course. Unfortunately, he and the other Dr. Doyle are gone this weekend, though, out resurrecting . . . what is it this time, Lena? Woolly mammoths?”
“Something like that.”
Martin smiled ingratiatingly at Lena. “There’s never been a shortage of atoms to do the job, it just hasn’t been until now that we can make the right ones merely by rearranging the wrong ones. And that goes for everything else we want, too: Food. Water. Medicine. We won’t ever have to worry about doing without something again. “
Abigail spoke up for the first time. “I agree, of course, that until now people have been short on basic necessities, but I wouldn’t say that scarcity’s the main culprit. There’s been grain rotting in silos and trains and planes to deliver it for years. But we chose not to.”
“I wouldn’t say we chose not to,” said Martin, somewhat amused. “We may have had the potential to do something, but we have the potential to do a lot of things that we’d never actually do—for all sorts of reasons. And if you’d indulge the prosaic idiom . . . ‘that’s where the rubber meets the road.’”
It was astonishing to hear, really; high school students actually having a conversation about things that mattered. Even though Martin was pompous and full of himself, it was like, finally, after all this time, I’d found people that pushed me to think about real issues in the world. The stuff that actually made a difference.
“Clearly, you’re right about people not suffering—and it’s incredible,” Abigail ventured, tentatively. “But, the quantity of something isn’t universally . . . well, if you look back, the ‘Enlightenment’ didn’t make the Jacobins any more enlightened during The Terror, let alone the Germans a century and a half later who had all those thinkers recorded at their convenience. And now we have more words than ever on the link.”
“But I wouldn’t say that’s a bad thing, Abs, would you?”
“No, just that . . . that just because we have something—even a whole lot of something—doesn’t mean we’re going to use it correctly.”
“What does correctly even mean? That strikes me as rather elitist. Not that you’re an elitist, Abs, but you know what I’m getting at. And things are pretty crazy at the moment, sure, though I guess I’m just not sure what you’re arguing for.”
Abigail looked deep in thought, but rather than wait for an answer Martin yawned and turned to me. “So, Carter, are you new here? Visiting? Why haven’t I seen you before?”
“Um, well, I’m actually from a small fishing village in Alaska,” I responded, grateful that the lie I’d told Lena on the spot wasn’t as terrible as it could’ve been. “I’m staying with a cousin for the week . . . that’s why the French is a little rusty. La langue française n’a pas encore vraiment voyagé là-bas.”
“What part?”
“It’s off the southwest coast,” I said without hesitation, bringing up a detailed Alaska map on my film, drawing from words we were using in real-time. “On
an island accessible only by ferry.”
“Charming,” said Abigail. “I’ve never had the pleasure of meeting an Alaskan before. What’s that whole constant sunlight deal like?”
I waited a second while my software analyzed the question before starting, “Down in Cadamas we just get a few weeks, but my family gets almost three months up in the Arctic Circle. When I was younger I’d visit my cousins in Barrow during summer and we’d play street hockey downtown at 3 a.m. in the daylight and it was like the end of the world. Everything vanishes. And you’re just in this hulking, glacial vacuum.”
I’d been nervously handling the science fair tractor beam in my pocket, but as I kept speaking and people focused on me, intrigued, a certain confidence began to bloom.
“But then we get perpetual darkness, too, you know, and it can get to you, especially if you’re not used to it. Sometimes it’s like you’re too tired to go to sleep when everyone else is up, or it’s the opposite, and so it always feels like you’re chasing something.”
“Can’t you just make it night in VR and sleep there?”
“Sure, but sometimes it’s just hard to convince yourself that the fake thing’s the real thing, even when they’re identical. Even when it’d easier. There’s this little voice in the back of your head.”
“Just filter it out with your BCI. There’s modules that’ll automatically keep you in an optimal cognitive band without having to even think about it,” said Martin. “Anyway . . . what brings you here now, though? Shouldn’t you be in school or something?”
“Actually, that’s why I’m here—visiting them. Trying to figure out where to go next year,” I said, the words rolling out with increasing ease.
“Really, the only ones worth considering are Stanford and Berkeley. Companies don’t bother with graduates from anywhere but the best, since they have their pick. Keeps things simple,” said Martin.
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