I sat in a wooden chair and I waited. A man in the next room spoke on his cell phone, his voice easy and certain. Somehow I felt sure he was speaking to her …that physically frail woman with the oversized head and the fishlike face; the woman he answered to, both his leader and master.
His suite was inside the Alto Do Mundo. The third largest structure inside the city, it housed much of the elite. In life I had seen it only from afar, watching it from the rail that took me to work. Once I investigated a murder there. Part of me had always envied those inside, even then.
His apartment suite was big and very cold. It conveyed his privilege and power to all, no matter where they might look. The design he’d chosen was minimalist, open rooms integrating high-end appliances and electronics, where each line and edge was arranged perfectly. I admired what he’d done, the oasis of order that he’d fashioned away from the chaos of the streets below. My eyes followed the room’s flow, and I found comfort in it, even though I knew that it would soon be gone. Very soon the man on the phone would be dead. Very soon the Alto Do Mundo itself, and everyone inside it, would exist only as fading memories.
Normally, I’d never have gotten inside, but we were a vice of his, and he’d had me brought in, bypassing security. When I arrived, I found the door was open. In the entryway he’d left a cardboard gift box for me, with a note card. The gift box contained a series of items: an elaborate set of silk lingerie, a black wig, and an array of cosmetics. There was a computer printout, explaining what he wanted.
It should have been humiliating to me, applying makeup to my lips and nipples, cinching in my waist, and pushing up my breasts, then sitting and posing while he took his time. It should have been an affront, but as I sat on the chair, I felt nothing. The truth was that I’d hoped I would feel something. I wanted to feel some sense of humiliation, even excitement, but the reality was that I did not. The closest I came was the wanting itself.
What drove me now were purpose and survival. Not survival in the traditional sense—I’d already lost my life—but my mind was still aware. It knew that it was finite, and that whatever came after was unknown …dark and empty and endless.
That unknown was like a void. Beneath my consciousness and my memories, it yawned like a black hole in the depths of space. With each passing second, it pulled me deeper, away from all that I knew. Any second I might fall across that rim, that dark event horizon, and plunge down through the field of my memories to the one thing left that scared me to my core. Life and death were just concepts, but not that endless unknown. That bottomless void was real.
The man on the phone was speaking Japanese. I tuned my hearing a little as he spoke, and watched the translation scroll at the bottom edge of my periphery:
No. Wherever it came from, it wasn’t supposed to be there. I was already out of the building when …
The words passed by over the swell of my breasts. I’d been attractive in life, and I’d known that. Men had stared at those breasts, compelled by their curves, but they were just meat now. The blood that moved through them was black and cold. The veins could be covered up with body paint, but the flesh was not alive.
The man who had me brought to him did not care.
…knew where I was, it was arranged beforehand. I didn’t do anything wrong….
He moved past a doorway, through my line of sight. He wore a gold watch and an expensive suit of which the tones matched my lingerie. He glanced at me, and I captured his image. He was a powerfully featured Asian man, with long hair that was thick and luxurious. His skin was smooth and pampered.
Identity confirmed: Takanawa, Hiro.
He moved out of view and continued speaking. My mind drifted as I watched the words go by.
…should be thanking me. I managed to keep one of them. You only really need one….
The field of my memories stirred like embers, a field of lights that were tagged and catalogued. I could access each at will. I saw images of him at the hotel. During the raid, the agents had let him go. He’d left with something of ours.
My memories were now of two different types: those formed before my death and those formed after. A laser line cut between, and it was there that I found my new purpose. Each second that passed, it was a reminder. In my first living memory, I was five, and for a time my memories had been pure. As my life went on, they became fragmented. Bits and pieces were stolen. They were manipulated and sometimes changed. I had been rewired by an unseen force and lived two lives, and not known. Approaching the memory separation between my life and my death, the embers came to contain more lies than truth.
Until my last, when I lay on a sofa and blood pumped out of my chest. I saw the face of the man in front of me, and heard the last words I would hear in my life.
“What a waste.”
Too much of my life had been just that: a waste. I’d worked so hard for a shot at moving up, not knowing it was all lies. I’d pushed myself until there was nothing left. I did it because I regretted my choice, and because I was afraid. Once I was dead, I didn’t want to come back. I’d have done anything to get out of it, but I never got the chance.
The name of my killer turned out to be Lev—Lev Prutsko, the last of four Slavic recruits brought in for key terror strikes. Samuel Fawkes had bought him through a broker for the price of a new car. He was the closest I had now to a friend.
Fawkes’s purpose was Lev’s purpose, and now mine: preserve the free will of all humanity. Stop any more people from sharing my fate. It was clear and absolute. An echo from my old mind latched on to it as a justice to be served and also, more secretly, as a distraction from that dark void, below.
Yes. Yes. Good-bye.
Mr. Takanawa stepped through the doorway and slipped his cell phone into his suit jacket. I sat still and did not breathe as he approached and faced me at arm’s length. I couldn’t read the expression on his face. Men had stared at me before, but this was unlike anything I recalled. He inspected me like he might a statue, not yet certain what he thought. Only his erection betrayed something more. After a minute or so, he came closer and knelt down in front of me. He moved his face close to mine.
An orange light coursed up each side of his neck, thick, hot lines that branched out before fading. I followed them down below his shirt collar, to the heavy coal that pulsed inside his chest. A thin line appeared in my periphery. It spiked each time his heart beat.
“You’re a beautiful woman,” he said, so close that I could feel his breath on my face.
Another of them once said those words to me. Later, I’d be told to forget what I’d heard, and I would, like I was told. Every time I heard them it was like the first time, unexpected and welcome.
Nothing stirred inside me when I heard them now. As best I could interpret, he was earnest, but I was not beautiful, nor a woman. I was something different now.
“I said you are beautiful,” the man said again, his eyes narrowing a little.
“Thank you.”
He looked into my eyes for a bit longer, their soft, moonlit glow reflected on his face.
He likes that, I thought. It’s part of it, for him.
“May I ask you something?” I said to him softly. His face changed, just a little. It wasn’t interaction that he wanted; it was something else, but I was curious.
“One question,” he said.
“Why revivors?”
He was known to be suddenly violent, and I was ready for that, but he stayed calm. In answer, he just smiled. He moved so close I saw the glow from my eyes reflected in his own.
His pupils opened to two dark, glassy spots. It happened when they exerted their power. He was trying to control me, I could see. When he failed, I saw fear creep into his eyes. The heat in his chest pulsed faster and harder, and the orange glow up the sides of his neck grew hotter as the veins there became engorged. The line monitoring his heart spiked higher. What he saw scared him, but it was more than that. It was exhilaration.
“There’s a darkness inside of you,” he said. “All of you. I can’t control you or know you, and that …”
He reached forward and took my hands in his own. They were dry and very warm. He stood, and pulled me up gently to face him. His eyes went back to normal.
“Come with me,” he said, and walked past me. When I turned, I saw him cross toward the bedroom. As I followed, I pulled the wig from my head and let it fall to the floor. Cold air blew across the skin of my bare scalp. When we were inside he turned, frowning as I placed my cold hands on his chest.
“That’s wrong,” he said. “Put it back on.”
I slid my left hand up the side of his neck, running my fingertips through his coarse black hair. He didn’t pull away, but was still frowning.
“You heard me,” he said. “Do what I sa—”
My hand split along an invisible seam and splayed between the middle and ring finger. His body, so alive, jumped. His eyes darted to the cavity and stared. Fear returned when the blade inside caught the light.
I could have impaled him before he could move, but the blade was not for him. A thin plastic tube shot out from beneath it. The needle locked on the heat inside his neck and plunged into the branching orange band of light.
By the time he slapped his hand over the sting, the tube had reeled back and my arm had snapped shut. He just stared at me, confused.
“What—”
The toxin acted fast and paralyzed him. His arms fell to his sides, and he staggered back. The muscles in his face began to loosen.
I stepped in and supported him as he fell. I reached into his jacket and took the gun, then tossed it onto the bed.
“What …are you …doing?” he gasped, as I eased him back onto the plush comforter. I recorded and transmitted his vitals. The excitement he’d shown before was gone now. All that was left was his fear.
Subject secured.
Good. Site 1 confirmed secure. Transmitting collection point.
Takanawa could see the gun, out of reach. His eyes locked on to it, but he couldn’t move. I watched him try to, and fail, as I sat down on the bedspread next to him. I waited for him to look back up at me.
“Where is the last one?” I asked him. He could still speak, but he tried to shake his head.
“You know what I mean,” I said. “We got the other eleven, but you were seen to take one. Where is it?”
“…don’t know,” he breathed.
“If it’s here,” I said, “I will leave with that and nothing else. Do you understand?”
He understood. I could see it in his eyes.
“Where is it?” I asked again.
“…not here …”
I’d search just to be sure, but I believed him. He’d have handed off the device before now. Lev would find out what he knew.
I left the room and changed back into street clothes, then stowed the lingerie and wig in my bag. I looked at myself in the bathroom mirror, and wiped the makeup away.
It had taken time to find myself again, after reanimation. There’d been a disconnect with my reflection, like it was somebody else. At first I thought it was the physical change; the grayish skin tone or dark veins that showed through. As time passed, though, I saw it was something else.
The image in the mirror was someone else; Faye Dasalia had been lost long ago. She had been lost before she was ever killed. All that was left of her existed in me. She’d been revived, in me, when Nico woke me. All that she truly was and ever would be had emerged only in death. I’d only recently made her face my own. The woman from before was not really Faye. My memories formed from across that divide, and they were not corrupted. I was Faye Dasalia, more complete than I ever had been in life.
Beginning transport.
Acknowledged.
I went back into the bedroom where he lay, his chest rising and falling very slowly. He was awake and aware. His eyes bargained with me as I approached him.
“It’s time for you to come with me,” I said in his ear as I got a grip on him. I pulled the LW suit over us, and lifted up his body. He was frightened, but he didn’t need to be.
Whatever answer he’d sought in revivors, he’d understand soon enough.
I approached the place where Calliope suggested we meet, thinking maybe I should have picked the spot myself. The narrow street outside had a row of motorcycles hugging a brick wall under an overpass where everything was covered in graffiti. Heat rose from a metal grate next to the curb, and a patch of fog drifted across a broken sidewalk littered with cigarette butts.
Information request complete.
The results of my dig on Concrete Falls came up as I crossed the street. The miner found a lot of media noise about the bombing, but most of it was commentary. The limited footage of bomber didn’t provide a positive identification. That fact alone suggested he’d known where the security cameras were. There were only a few seconds of footage, and even taken from different angles, they could show only so much. The bomber was male. He had dark skin. He appeared to be between thirty and forty. No thermal images or X-rays were taken. It could have been a revivor.
Whoever he was, he’d moved past the recruitment stations and through a door that led into the back offices. When this was noticed, two guards moved to follow, but never reached him.
Given his movements, it was thought that the bomber had specifically targeted the offices where the Heinlein reps were set up. If Sean was right, though, and Fawkes was actually behind the attack, then it wasn’t just to make some political point or to hurt Heinlein. It wasn’t easy for Fawkes to make a move like that, and it put him at huge risk of being discovered. There had to be a reason for it.
Hey, you showing up or what? Calliope.
I’m here now.
The first time I met Calliope Flax was in a parking garage after a revivor tried to kill her. The last time I’d seen her was after her interrogation, banged up and fuzzy from the dope. She was third tier, a heartbeat away from living on the street. The reward I sent her way for the tip she provided didn’t even cover her medical bills, and I knew that without help she was going under. I suggested the service.
Later she disappeared. When I finally tracked her down, I found out she was stationed in Yambio.
I could hear the beat from outside as I approached the front of the place. Pushing through the heavy door, I walked into a dark room full of loud music. It was packed full of tough-looking customers. A few guys looked at me, noting the reflection from the JZI. Word started spreading that a cop just walked in.
I looked around but I didn’t see her. Between the darkness, the smoke, and the bodies it was hard to spot anyone.
I’m here. Where are you?
Downstairs.
A set of stairs led to a basement floor where a second bar was set up in front of a bank of video screens. Sitting alone near the top of the steps was a woman who looked out of place. She was well dressed, with a plain wool cap that didn’t match the outfit. The only thing she had in common with the other patrons was her tattoo: a snake that ringed her neck, then swallowed its tail. She was sitting at a table without a drink in front of her. She looked bored.
When I started to move past her, she looked up with bright blue eyes and waved for me to come closer. I held up my hand to indicate I was meeting someone else and couldn’t stop, and she reached out and took it. The second her cold fingers touched my hand, she zeroed in on a pressure point and sent a jolt up my forearm. She smiled faintly when she saw my surprise, and pulled me gently toward her table.
“I’m Penny,” she shouted over the music.
“Can I have my hand back?” She let go and I flexed my fingers.
“You’re kind of cute,” she said, reaching toward my face. I went to stop her, and she brushed my hand away casually. She touched my cheek, then ran her fingers through my hair.
“Are you always this forward?”
“What’s the matter? Are you not used to being touched by a woman?”
The truth was that I wasn’t. Not anymore. She seemed satisfied by my lack of an answer, taking her hand away.
“So you’re him, huh?”
“Him who?”
Her pupils widened, and I felt dizzy for a second. It passed almost immediately, and her eyes went back to normal.
“You are him. You’re Nico Wachalowski,” she shouted.
“Okay, you got my attention. Who are you?”
She leaned closer, putting her lips to my ear.
“Someone wants to meet with you,” she said.
“You don’t say.”
“I do say.”
“And who would that be?”
“Motoko Ai.”
I remembered Sean’s words scrawled on the bathroom mirror: Motoko Ai …she will contact you soon.
“Should I know that name?” I asked.
“She has information you’ll be interested in.”
“What kind of information?”
“Information about Samuel Fawkes.”
If she didn’t have my attention before, she had it then. She leaned back, looking satisfied. Her big eyes looked me up and down.
“I guess I can see why she’s into you,” she said.
“What?”
“Not Ai. She’s not interested in stuff like that. I mean Zoe.”
“Are you a friend of Zoe’s?”
“Sort of. Tell me; are you just completely clueless?”
“What?”
“Because if you are, then open your eyes, and if you aren’t, then stop being careless with her.”
The whole thing caught me off guard. Before I could answer, she changed the subject again.
“Will you meet with Ai?”
“Where?”
“We’ll set it up through Zoe.”
“Zoe?”
“She’s coming too. Will you come?”
“Yes.”
“The events of two years ago were nothing, Mr. Wachalowski. Please be there.”
Before I could answer, she hopped off her stool and gave me a wave as she moved off into the crowd.
You get lost or what? Cal.
No. Keep your pants on.
I made my way downstairs and found her standing against the far wall with a big guy on either side of her. She looked like I remembered, with the same cropped hair and the same crooked nose. Somewhere inside me, tension let go; she was in one piece. She was talking to a black man with a cauliflower ear when she noticed me and waved. When she smiled, I saw she never replaced the missing tooth.
What are you drinking? I asked.
You buying?
Sure.
Whiskey. Straight up.
I got the bartender’s attention and let him scan my card. With a glass in each hand, I made my way over to her. The two guys were gone before I got there.
“Friends of yours?” I asked, handing one over.
“Fight buddies,” she said. She took it and drank half without blinking.
“You get set up okay?”
“Yeah. Guy named Buckster from that group Second Chance picked me up. They set me up with a place.”
Second Chance. Sean had written that on his bathroom mirror, minutes before he disappeared.
“Who set you up?” I asked.
“Second Chance,” she said. “They work with vets. What’s the problem? You look like you just shit yourself.”
I ran a search on the organization. It was like Cal said; they were big on fund-raising for vets and charity work. They ran free clinics in some of the worst neighborhoods. They were also one of the biggest referrers for Posthumous Service recruits, funneling third-tier citizens to recruitment centers to get wired. Centers like Concrete Falls.
“What was your contact’s name again?” I asked.
“Leon Buckster. Seriously, what’s up?”
I shook my head.
“Probably nothing,” I said. “Keep an eye open for me though, would you?”
“Keep an eye open for what?”
“Anything to do with revivors.”
“Hell,” she said, “he was trying to get some hobo to wire up when I stepped off the fucking train. I figured he got a kickback or something. Does this have to do with a case?”
“Maybe,” I said. “Just keep an eye open. Have you found a job yet?”
“Still working on that.”
“Will you go back to the arena?”
Can’t.
She held up her left hand so I could see it. Even in the dim light, I could see the black veins standing out.
Sorry, I said. I didn’t know.
Ugly, huh?
I’ve seen worse. The hand’s not a bad match. Where’s the join?
She pulled the sleeve of her jacket up so I could see where the skin changed color. Inside there was a thin filter, a piece of revivor tech that handled the nerve and muscle interaction and kept the living side from attacking the necrotized one. A small circulator ran the revivor blood through the limb. It wasn’t a bad job.
How’s it working out for you?
She shrugged like it was no big deal, but I could see it was.
Do you get used to it?
Not really.
I did some digging. You made a name for yourself over there.
She shrugged again, like it was no big deal, but, honestly, it was. With no formal education, she’d gone from grunt status to full control over a squad of revivors in less than two years. In that short time, the bandits who ran the area learned to know her by a name they themselves had given her.
I’m impressed, I said.
Yeah?
Yes.
How impressed?
I wasn’t sure what she meant. When I didn’t answer, she gritted her teeth, then leaned forward and grabbed my lapel. She put her lips near my ear and I could smell the whiskey on her breath.
“I know the score,” she said. “A tour buys you a leg up, but that’s it. I’m done with the grind and I can’t fight anymore, but I didn’t lose my hand over there to come back and flip burgers.”
She sighed, breath hot on my neck, then leaned back and let go of my coat.
“Before I left, you told me I could be more than I was,” she said. “You said if I busted my ass, it could all be mine. You mean that?”
“I did.”
The reality was that if she hadn’t enlisted, Calliope would have ended up in jail, in a shelter, or on the street. The housing project where she was holed up got shut down while she was gone, and the police had forced everybody out. Some were arrested, and the rest slipped through the cracks. With no education, money, or assets, and sitting at tier three with no way to get any, she would have lost what little she had.
I told myself that when I looked at her hand.
“Well, here I am,” she said.
The military had changed her. She looked more in control and more focused. I thought I could help her. I owed her that much. In some ways, I owed her my life.
Ex-military, especially decorated ones, pulled a lot of weight. I have some contacts. What can you do?
I’m wired to run revivors—units or groups. I know weapons and intel extraction.
That wasn’t bad, actually. It would be easy, even after coming back, for someone like her to end up back where she started. It would be a waste.
How did you like soldiering?
Better than flipping burgers. I raised my eyebrows, and she changed her tone.
I liked it, she said.
There’s always private military. Stillwell Corps takes a lot of soldiers on after their tours. It’s good pay, access to the latest tech, and some great training.
She thought about that, and I could see the idea take root. She nodded.
That sounds okay, she said.
Let me put out some feelers.
She smiled and nodded again. She punched me in the arm. Thanks.
The smile went away and she looked at the floor. Her tongue poked through the gap where her tooth was missing.
Thanks for writing me over there too.
No problem.
You do that because you thought you had to?
At first.
The truth was, I did it because I didn’t think anyone else would. Any kind of contact from back home was a big deal over there. I kept the messages short, and wrote three times without hearing back. After that, I stopped. It was months later when, out of the blue, I got a message back from her. After that, it got to be a regular thing. I kept her up on things she asked about, and she told me stories about day-to-day downtime in the middle of a war zone, something I knew well. She never talked about combat or any of the bloodshed I knew she must have seen. I never asked.
Yeah, well, thanks.
I liked hearing from you. It took me back.
I’ll bet.
We going to stay friends?
We’ll see.
She smiled, eyelids drooping. She was drunk.
You worry about me?
I did, a little.
A call came in as she shook her glass at the bartender across the room.
Incoming call. It was headquarters. I held up one hand while I picked up.
Wachalowski here.
Agent, your victim, Holst, from the raid. She’s dead.
I thought she was stable.
She was. Someone assassinated her right there in the hospital.
What?
Your operative was the only one with her when it happened.
What are you saying? Zoe shot her?
I’m not saying anything. I’m just telling you what happened.
Where is Zoe now?
She fled the scene.
That would have been hours ago. If it was true, she had to be losing it by now.
Do not let them bring her in, understand? I’ll find her.
I’ll do what I can, but—
Don’t let them bring her in.
Calliope was looking at me and I noticed her scowl.
“You got somewhere else you got to be?” she asked.
“I’m sorry, official business. Have a few drinks on me. We’ll have to catch up later.” Her scowl deepened.
Who is Zoe Ott?
That took me by surprise. Cal hadn’t seen Zoe since the factory, when she pulled her out of Fawkes’s holding pens. She hadn’t said anything about it even under direct questioning. I had assumed that Zoe made her forget, though she never admitted to it.
I ran a check on my JZI, and found a brief intrusion. She’d been monitoring the wire for references to Zoe, and when she got a hit she’d snooped at least part of the conversation. I’d underestimated Calliope Flax.
Cal, listening in on FBI communications is a felony—
Who is she, Wachalowski?
She was one of the people we recovered from the underground factory when it was infiltrated.
I know that. I was there. I mean, who is she?
What do you mean?
Her mouth parted to show the gap from her missing tooth, and her eyes got serious.
Look, I saw her at the FBI. I know you know what I’m talking about. What is the deal with that spooky little bitch? What did she do to me?
I didn’t have a good answer for that. She needed one, I could see, but I didn’t have one for her.
Don’t tell me you don’t know her, she said.
I know her.
Did she make me forget?
If she was asking, then she knew the answer to that. I wasn’t sure what Zoe had done to her, exactly, but I knew it was something. Cal needed someone—me—to verify that, but there were more of them out there than just Zoe. That kind of knowledge could be dangerous.
You saved her life. Do you remember going underground?
Parts.
You went down there to get her, I think.
Did she make me forget?
We’ll talk about it later.
It’s a yes or no question, Wachalowski.
It’s not that simple. We’ll talk about it later, but for now, don’t say anything about it to anyone else.
What?
I mean it. You’ll attract the wrong kind of attention. Don’t talk about it.
What wrong kind of attention? What the hell is going on?
Look, what happened two years ago …it didn’t end then. The bombings, the attacks—they’re going to get worse. Powerful people are involved in this, and I don’t want you getting caught up in it.
And this thing you can’t get into, it involves revivors and Second Chance?
I have to go. Forget I said it. I turned to leave but she grabbed my coat.
I want in. Let me in. You can trust me.
I know.
Then trust me. I’ll sniff around.
I should have stopped her, but I didn’t. The truth was, though, that I needed all the help I could get, and even at the FBI, I wasn’t sure who I could count on.
I have to go.
She nodded, but I already didn’t like the look in her eye. I had a second opportunity to stop her, and I didn’t. Instead I waved good-bye and began to make my way back through the crowd.
I sat on my couch, waiting for the police to come knocking on my door. They were going to blame me for what happened at the hospital; I knew they were. Someone shot that woman, and as far as they knew, I was the only one there. I wasn’t, but they weren’t going to believe me. No one else saw the other guy or revivor or whatever it was. No one else saw it. They thought I did it. The cops were probably looking for me already.
I should have just stayed there. I didn’t have a gun; I couldn’t have done it. Now they’d think I just threw it away or hid it or something. Going right home was stupid; it was the first place they’d look. They were probably on their way over already and there I was, just waiting for it to happen.
If they did come, I’d send them away. I’d have to. I could just make them think I didn’t have anything to do with it, which I didn’t. It wouldn’t even be a lie. I’d tell them the truth. A revivor did it. It didn’t matter if they believed me. I’d make them believe me.
I wanted a drink. I couldn’t calm down, and I just really, really wanted a drink. The pills helped, but right then I didn’t care. My heart was still beating too fast and I tried to breathe slower, but I couldn’t.
I closed my eyes and squeezed my fists against them. My hands were shaking, and I was sweating. I wanted to scream. Maybe the drinking was killing me before, but I must have been happier than this. I never had to feel like I did almost every day now….
“They took the ship,” a voice said. I opened my eyes, and my apartment was gone. I was sitting on a metal floor, painted white. The room I was in was small, and it was dark except for an emergency light mounted on one wall.
There was a man sitting a few feet away. He had long, dirty hair and the start of a beard. His face was pale and his lips were chapped and peeling. His eyes were half shut. He looked like he could barely move.
“Who are you?” I asked him. Behind him, I could see more people huddled against the wall. They all looked like him, or worse.
“They took the ship,” he said again. His voice was hoarse. I watched as he lifted a glass jar off the floor and it shook in his hand, like he could barely lift it. Dark yellow liquid sloshed inside, and I realized it was urine. He put the jar to his chapped lips and drank.
I put my hand over my mouth, horrified. His eyes looked apologetic and ashamed.
“We can’t go out there,” he whispered, “We won’t make it. This way is better.”
Someone knocked on the door, and I jumped. When I turned, I was back in my apartment. The strange room was gone. The man with the urine was gone. The knock came again.
It was the police. They were here to get me. My heart started thumping as I got up off the couch and stood in the middle of the room, not moving.
“It’s not the cops,” a woman’s voice said from the other side. “Come on, open up!”
I headed over and opened the door. It was that woman, the one from the subway the other night. She had on the same wool hat and the same red poncho. Under one arm she had a big, flat cardboard box that was tied with a bow.
“Oh,” I said. “It’s you.”
“Penny,” she said.
“Sorry, I thought …I can’t get into it. I just …”
“The cops won’t come here,” she said. “Don’t worry. It’s taken care of.”
“Taken care of?”
“They thought about it and realized they made a mistake. Besides, the Feds stepped in and took over.”
“But they’ll—”
“They’ll be looking for the revivor, like they should be. You’re off the hook. Forget about it.”
The whole thing was weird, but I had to admit, it was a huge weight off my chest.
“You going to let me in?” she asked.
“Um, sure.”
I moved out of her way and she walked in, looking around my place. She didn’t look like she thought much of what she saw, but she didn’t say anything.
“How do you know where I live?” I asked. She shrugged.
“I know a lot about you.”
“Have you been following me?”
“A little.”
She said it like it wasn’t a big deal. Who was she? She stared up at me with her blue eyes that kind of reminded me of Nico’s, and I felt a little dizzy for a second.
The phone rang, and my heart jumped. Maybe it was him.
“Never mind that,” the woman said. “He’ll leave a message. I want to talk to you first.”
I got that dizzy feeling again. The phone rang a few more times; then the machine picked up.
“Zoe? It’s Nico. I’ve been trying to re—”
“Who are you?” I asked.
“Ai sent me,” she said.
“Who?”
“Ai. I work for her.”
“…straightened it out with them. Just stay put for now. Call me as soon as you get …”
She talked to me like we knew each other, like we were old friends. She was like some robot friend in a box that got mailed to my doorstep. It was weird, but I didn’t feel funny about letting her in. Something told me I could trust her.
“No offense …”
“Penny.”
“No offense, Penny, but what do you want?”
“Ai wants to meet with you, and your friend Nico too.”
“Who’s Ai?” She pronounced it like the letter I.
“You’ll recognize her when you see her,” she said. “You’ve seen her before, sort of. She’s seen you too.”
“Who is she?”
“The most important person you’ll ever meet,” she said.
“Why does she want to meet with me?”
“You’re important too.”
“Yeah, right.”
There was another knock at the door, and I saw I’d left it just hanging open, which I never did. Karen was standing there in the doorway, looking from Penny to me.
“Oh, sorry,” she said. “Am I interrupting?”
“No,” I said. I started fumbling for how I was going to introduce the weird girl who’d just showed up and who I didn’t even know, but she introduced herself.
“I’m Penny,” she said, holding out her hand with a smile. Karen smiled back and shook it.
“Karen.”
“It’s very nice to meet you, Karen.”
“You too.”
She looked at both of us for a second.
“Are you two related?”
“No,” I said. “No, no. She’s …from work.”
“Oh, you work at the FBI?” Karen asked.
“No.”
I saw Karen’s smile kind of go down a notch, and she looked confused.
“Actually, I’m with the Lesbian Recruitment Corps,” Penny said. “We’re—”
“Okay, that’s it,” I said, cutting her off. I went to usher Karen out so I could get rid of the weirdo, but before I could, Penny’s eyes changed. Her pupils opened all the way, and Karen’s face relaxed. The confused look that was starting to get mad went away, and she looked totally at ease.
“It doesn’t matter what we say,” Penny said to me over her shoulder. She thought it was funny.
“I’m a new friend of Zoe’s,” she said to Karen. “I don’t work at the FBI, but she met me through work. That’s all you need to know. I’ll be a very good influence on her, and I’m no threat at all to your friendship.”
“Oh,” Karen said.
“I’m pretty too. And funny.”
“Come on,” I said. “Stop it.”
“Well, those things are true,” she said, but I thought that might be debatable.
“Let her go.”
It wasn’t like I’d never done it to her myself, but I wasn’t comfortable watching someone else do it to her. Penny didn’t argue; she just nodded.
“Forget everything else we said after we met,” she told Karen. “It’s not important.”
“Okay.”
Her eyes went back to normal, and Karen snapped out of it.
“Give us a second,” I said to Penny. I led Karen back to the front door.
“Sorry,” I said. “She won’t be long.”
“It’s okay,” she said. “I just wanted to tell you I was sorry about before. You’re right about Ted. I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’m sorry I canceled our lunch date.”
She looked over my shoulder, then back at me.
“She’s really pretty. She’s funny too,” she said. I nodded weakly.
“You’re not mad?”
“About what?”
“I don’t know.”
“Because of her?” she said, smiling. “No. We should all go do something together.”
I tried to think of an excuse of why we shouldn’t do that, but nothing came into my head.
“Dancing,” Karen said.
“I don’t know about dancing, Karen.”
“Too much? Well, something. I’ll get out of your hair for now.”
She lowered her voice and leaned closer.
“Tell me all about her later.”
“I will. So you’re not mad? About her or Ted or anything?”
She hugged me. Karen liked to hug, and I wouldn’t admit it, but I kind of liked being hugged by her too.
“Yes, I was mad. Friends get mad at each other sometimes,” she said in my ear. “I love you.”
She pulled away and waved, then slipped out. I stared at the door. I don’t know what made her say that last part. I don’t think anyone had said that to me since I was little.
“Sorry about that,” Penny said. She actually looked kind of apologetic.
“Just …tell me what you want.”
“I would like to officially invite you and your friend Nico to meet with Ai at Suehiro 9,” she said.
“What’s that?”
“A restaurant.”
“Why a restaurant?”
“I don’t know. It’s public. It’s exclusive. They have good security. Plus I think she wants to impress you.”
“Is it fancy?”
“Totally.”
A fancy restaurant didn’t sound like anyplace I wanted to go. I didn’t have anything to wear to a place like that.
“Don’t worry about what to wear,” she said, like she read my mind. “She gave me this to give to you.”
She handed me the cardboard box with the bow on it.
“Go on. Open it.”
I pulled off the bow and took the top off the box. There was some thin paper underneath, and under that was a black dress. There were high-heel shoes in there too. They looked expensive. They looked really expensive.
“It’ll fit,” she said.
“She’s giving this to me?”
“Don’t worry so much,” Penny said. “It’s not a big deal. Come on, she’s footing the bill. If you don’t go, then I don’t get to go.”
“That woman,” I said, still looking at the dress, “the one I was with at the hospital. She was with you guys, wasn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“You know I was with her when she died?”
“Yes. Don’t worry about her. It wasn’t your job to protect her. She knew what she was getting into.”
“Why does your friend want to meet with me and Nico?”
“I don’t know,” she said, “I just know it’s important. She’ll explain everything.”
“I don’t know if Nico will go or not.”
“Don’t worry about him,” she said, waving her hand. “He was easy. He’ll go.”
“I don’t know if he’ll want to go with me.”
“I’m telling you; he’s on the hook.”
“Why didn’t she just come herself?”
“That’s what she’s got me for,” she said. “Besides, I think she thought you and me would hit it off, maybe become friends.”
“Friends?”
“Yeah, friends,” she said, holding out her hands. “You don’t want to keep all your eggs in one basket. Do you have something against friends?”
“No—”
“Okay, then.”
She opened the door and turned to face me in the doorway before she left. She gave me a weird look, and I felt my heart rate slow down a little.
“It’s tonight,” she said, handing me a card. “Call Nico, and tell him to pick you up. See you there.”
She left. I closed the door behind her. After a few seconds, I locked it.
I should go see Karen.
In spite of how strange the visit was, that was the thing I couldn’t stop thinking as soon as she left. The way Karen’s face looked when she pushed her like that, and the way her whole attitude just changed completely afterward. It didn’t seem right somehow.
But you do it all the time, don’t you?
Not all the time.
But you do it.
Maybe. I guessed I did. Not as much as before, but I had to admit I did sometimes still, and not just to her. Was that what it was like? If anyone else watched me the way I had just watched them, would they think it was just as wrong?
“Karen’s my friend,” I said out loud. She was my friend because she wanted to be, not because I made her. Not even I could make someone be my friend. You could make people do a lot of things, but you couldn’t make them like you.
In the end I decided not to go down. It seemed weird to show up again right after that. She was happy when she left. I figured I’d leave it at that.
Instead I took the dress the rest of the way out of the package. It looked like it cost a mint. I held it up in front of myself and went into the bathroom to see.
It was gorgeous. It was the nicest thing in my whole apartment.
I picked up my cell and called Nico’s number again. I was kind of hoping he wouldn’t pick up so I could just leave a message, but he did.
“Wachalowski,” he said.
“Um, hi. Nico?”
“Zoe. Did you get my message?”
“Um, not yet.”
“It’s okay. Look, I made some calls, and I don’t think you have to worry about the incident at the hospital.”
“No?”
“No. It got dropped.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. Someone else must have gotten involved.”
“So they’re not looking for me?”
“No,” he said, “but I don’t think this is over.”
“Yeah, me neither.”
He paused on the other end of the line.
“What’s wrong?”
“I kind of have something to ask you.”
“Sure.”
“I was wondering, if you’re not doing anything else, and if you feel like it, if you might want to go out to dinner.”
“Are you asking me out to dinner?”
“Not exactly,” I said. I was so embarrassed, I could hardly talk. He thought I was calling him to ask him out on a date. If I didn’t say something soon, he’d start making excuses why he couldn’t go. My throat felt like it was going to close up on me.
“Not exactly?”
“Well, someone wants to meet you …us …and …”
“I understand,” he said. “I was told to expect your call. Do you know who she is, Zoe?”
“The one who came here is named Penny. She said the one that wanted to see us both is named Ai, though.”
“Do you know that name?”
“No. Do you?”
“No.”
“Do you think we should go?”
“I do,” he said. He sounded serious. “Where and when?”
I flipped over the card she’d written the time on the back of it.
“Suehiro 9,” I said. “At seven.”
“That explains the suit,” he said, kind of to himself.
“What?”
“Nothing. I’ll pick you up at six thirty?”
“You’re going to pick me up?”
“Of course.”
“Oh. Good. Six thirty sounds good.”
“I’ll see you then.”
I hung up, then flopped down on the couch and let out a deep breath. It felt good. Ten minutes before, everything seemed like it was going wrong and there was no end in sight. Then that weird girl showed up, and just like that I was off the hook with the cops, the woman being dead wasn’t my fault, and I was going to a fancy dinner with Nico.
I was a little nervous about the restaurant. I wanted to go out somewhere with Nico, but that wasn’t how I pictured it. I was terrible in social situations, but with other people there I wouldn’t have to worry about what to say. Those other people would be like me, too. The woman in the hospital asked me if I wasn’t curious about them, and it was true that I was. Penny said the person we were meeting was the most important person I’d ever meet. I wondered what that meant. Why were they watching me?
“You’re important too.”
I held up the dress and looked at it again. I hoped I’d look okay in it.
“You guys have the wrong person,” I said to myself. They had to.
I was a lot of things, but important wasn’t one of them.
I awoke to darkness and total quiet. The sleep that came before was absolute, and completely devoid of dreams. When thought and sensation began to return, it was like being reborn.
When I was alive, I was always cold and tired. I no longer felt either. My metabolic system was now inert, and nanomachines in my blood did repairs. I didn’t need any kind of rest or sleep. Still, I found myself drawn to those rare moments when the darkness was complete, and I let everything go.
Impulses began to fire through my brain, as the implants lit up and formed connections. When my communications node went active, messages began to stream through the darkness.
Update: target obtained: Harris, Erica. Designation yellow.
Update: target obtained: Janai, Ryu. Designation yellow.
Update: target reclassified: Holst, Jan. Upgraded from yellow to red.
Update: target eliminated: Holst, Jan. Designation red.
Update: target reclassified: Ott, Zoe. Upgraded from green to yellow.
Update: target yield within eighty-five percent of target.
The field of memories appeared below them, and for a moment I was floating in space, consciousness and nothing more. They swirled around and through me like hot embers, revealing their contents in quick, bright flashes.
In one, keystrokes whispered under my fingers as I typed quickly into a chat portal at my home computer:
I feel like I should be able to let her go.
You didn’t kill her, came the reply.
I know. This shouldn’t bother me this much. Not anymore.
Maybe she had something to say, the person on the other end of the chat said. Something you didn’t hear.
In another, a street woman sat with me in a holding tank, back in my old precinct. She had the look of a late-stage junkie, with rotting teeth and bad skin. Only her eyes betrayed her intelligence, and the burden of a terrible knowledge.
“He doesn’t kill them all,” she said, her voice low. “I do.” I didn’t know who she was.
Update: New node(s) installed: eleven.
The embers scattered as the message came in. Sensation returned to my fingers and toes, and the low vibration in my chest resumed as my mind and my body reconnected. Once again, I was awake.
“Faye,” a man’s voice said. I opened my eyes and sallow light seeped in. I was lying on my back, reclining in a large examination chair. He was standing next to me, moonlit eyes glowing softly in the shadows.
“Lev.”
My nodes finished their initialization. According to the network chronometer, I’d been down for a long time. I didn’t recognize the room I was in. Several other revivors were there with us, their backs against the far wall. They stared at nothing, waiting.
Nearby I heard a snap and a buzzing sound, the closing of an electrical circuit. The buzz turned to a low hum.
“Hold,” a soft, synthesized voice said. “Gathering for iteration three-six-one.”
The hum continued for a minute or so, then began to rise in pitch. I heard restraints creaking as they were pulled taut.
“Active.”
“Why was I down for so long?” I asked. After dropping off Hiro Takanawa, I was sent to a safe house for maintenance. This went beyond maintenance. I scanned my nodes and found a new component. “Why was a new node installed?”
“Fawkes will explain everything.”
“It’s a second communications array.”
“I know.”
Bodies were moving nearby. In the gloom to my right was a plastic tent, hung from the ceiling with hooks. Through the clear sheeting I saw figures inside. They moved among rows of metal gurneys there, where bodies writhed and twisted.
“Checking signature,” the electronic voice said. A digital readout behind the plastic displayed the total reanimation time. They had gotten it way down.
I sat up slowly and looked around the room. There were ten other revivors there with us, electric eyes jittering in the darkness like they were trapped in a dream. The military kept revivors cut off, unable to communicate directly. Revivor command links were all hub and spoke; we each had a permanent link back to Fawkes, but he allowed, and encouraged, us to sync. When alone, we would set up a common pool and each of us would connect. On our communications band I sensed them, passing embers of memory back and forth as Lev and I sometimes did. They compared information, sometimes hoping to fill in empty fragments, sometimes just out of curiosity. In life I’d feared revivors, though I wouldn’t admit it. Now I’d found a strange sense of community in their company and ranks. To be alone with them brought a sense of calm. There was no reason to breathe or blink my eyes. There was no need to make eye contact or touch without an urge to do so. We might never speak, and would never have to. By nature of what we were, we’d shared experiences no human had and no human ever could.
It wasn’t necessary for us to speak, but Lev and I liked speaking to each other. Free from our brain chemistry, the act was satisfying, and that was all it ever needed to be.
“I searched,” I said, “but it wasn’t there.”
“I know.”
“We’ll never get to it now.”
“We have the other eleven devices,” he said. “Fawkes said they will be enough.”
The way he said the words caught my attention. He had recently talked to Fawkes directly.
“He plans to execute soon?” I asked. Lev nodded, his face solemn.
“How soon?”
“Very.”
“He’s given you the full list of targets, then?” In the shadows, he nodded.
“Alto Do Mundo,” he said, which I had already known, “The Central Media Communications Tower, and the UAC TransTech Center.”
“That’s it?”
“Three low-yield nukes for each site. The remaining two will be contingencies.”
The CMC Tower, the TransTech Center, and the Alto Do Mundo …they were the largest structures in the city. The UTTC was the largest in the world. I tried to picture destruction on that scale, that kind of terror unleashed on the city, but it was impossible. I recalled the suicide bombing I’d seen, staring through the storefront window with Nico at all the blood and pain that one bomb had caused. It made something stir inside, something I thought I’d completely forgotten. I thought what I felt was dread.
“When?” I asked. The many eyes jittered, unaware of us.
“Soon.”
When I was alive, I’d hunted Lev Prutsko. Or, rather, I’d hunted him and his comrades, thinking they were the same man. The murders they’d committed seemed glamorous to the media machine. I’d begun to see my face on the news bands, each time looking older and more desperate. I’d thought I was just driven, looking for a way out of the second tier, but my obsession had been manufactured. Fawkes’s enemies had been pulling my strings, stressing me like an engine ready to fail. In a way, Lev had saved me.
Fawkes went on to kill six hundred of what he’d termed the mutations, but it hadn’t been enough. Ai hit back, and destroyed almost everything.
Lev’s hand gripped mine and he helped me from the chair. For some reason, he only ever touched me.
“He wanted to speak to you when you woke up,” he said.
“Fawkes?”
“Yes.”
I hadn’t expected that. They were looking hard for him, and he knew it. If Fawkes would risk direct communications, he planned to attack before it would matter.
Incoming message: Fawkes, Samuel.
“What does he want?” I asked.
“I don’t know.” He wouldn’t say any more. He moved to the wall to join the rest of them. A moment later his eyes began to move, tuning into that wave of random jitter and leaving me there, alone.
Incoming message: Fawkes, Samuel. The words flashed in the darkness.
Accepted.
Hello, Faye. How are you feeling?
Better. My blood version has changed.
Yes.
I’ve also had a secondary communications node installed.
Yes.
I don’t recognize the specifications. What is it for?
It’s experimental. You’ll all receive one. You’ll need it soon.
Where did you get them?
They were stolen from Heinlein’s supply lines overseas and smuggled back.
Isn’t that dangerous?
Yes, but you’ll need them to communicate with the others.
Others?
I’ve nearly gathered the forces we’ll need to finish this. You know about the surplus nodes; they will come by sea. The second wave will strike from inside the city.
From inside? How?
They are also experimental. You will use the secondary communication nodes to communicate with them; previous models will be incompatible.
I don’t understand.
Hold on. I’m going to bring the new node online to help explain. It may be disorienting at first.
Disorienting how—
Link established.
Information came flooding across the link. At first it seemed like a stream of junk data, but as it piled in the new node’s buffers, I realized it wasn’t random at all; it was hundreds of individual links. The node sorted through the jumble of circuits, assigning a connection point to each thread. As it did, I understood what those links were.
It’s a revivor network. Once I’d gotten over that initial rush, I could view each of the separate connections. It was a revivor band, but not anything like the one that I knew. The data streams were constant but out of sync. Each one was a soft but chaotic trickle that I could sense but couldn’t decipher.
Do you hear them? Fawkes asked.
Yes, but I can’t understand. What do they mean?
Right now they’re still asleep. Maybe they’re dreaming. Do you want me to turn it off?
No.
They reminded me of waves at the shore, like hundreds of whispers rising and falling. They were almost as compelling as the void.
They’re inside the city? I asked.
Yes, but like the rest, they must remain hidden for now. When the two forces combine, they will be unstoppable.
When will that happen?
The ship is on its way now.
That soon, I thought. What do you want me to do?
I have a special task for you. I want you to offer a deal to Nico Wachalowski.
For a moment, I was stunned. His name stirred something inside me, something I couldn’t define. I waited for the swirl of embers to calm, for my memories to reorganize themselves. When faced with it, I saw how much I’d loved him. The ache that I’d spent so much time denying was clear enough to me now, though I could no longer actually feel it. I had truly loved this man.
I didn’t ask Fawkes why he had chosen me. It was because he thought Nico loved me, too.
What kind of deal do you mean? I asked.
I will explain to you how I want it phrased, he said. He needs to understand that he can’t stop this, but he can minimize it. He will have the power to save many lives, if he will do the right thing.
You think he’ll listen to me?
Yes. He is still looking for you. I think he will listen.
If he agrees, will we hold up our end?
Yes.
Under the tent, a circuit closed with a snap. Restraints were pulled tight as the buzz rose in pitch.
“Hold,” the electronic voice said. “Gathering for iteration three-six-two.”
And if he doesn’t agree? I asked.
Then you will have to kill him.
I nodded, though he wasn’t there to see it.
Do you understand, Faye?
I nodded again, by myself, in the dark.
Yes. I understand.