by Jim Keen
>Julia_Rothmore: (wide-area node connection)_(encryption @ 17*intermediate)_(connection requested): Alice? You there?
> Alice_Yu: (connection accepted): Yeah, under the BQE, you incoming?
>JR: Yes, 60 seconds (connection terminated)
Alice stepped into the rain and looked up, waiting. The water cooled her hot skin as constellations flew overhead.
“Officer Yu, I presume?” a soft male voice asked behind her.
She’d heard no one approach and spun to see a tall man facing her. He was pale with short, black hair and an immaculate suit worn like a shield. She ran all the scanning protocols her clock had, but he came back as a negative, an absence of information.
“I am. Who are you?” she asked.
“My name is Barlow, don’t you remember? You owe me a favor and I’m so looking forward to getting reacquainted,” he said and took a silver cigarette case from his pocket. “Would you like?”
“I don’t smoke anymore.”
He smiled, and the nausea was instant, her stomach bucking. She vomited onto the sidewalk. What came from inside her wasn’t human; it was black and foul like dead engine oil. She heaved again, and this time, the oil glinted with brass. She rested her hands on her knees and wiped her mouth with her hand.
“I’m sorry about that. I—” She looked up, but Barlow had vanished. She searched, clock glowing, but found nothing. “Well, that’s just fucking awesome.” She looked around once more, then turned back to the skies.
She watched the police Hopper drop from the emergency lane in the green hues of her perfect night vision. It landed in front of her, the Dyson engines whining, and she climbed into the warm interior. Julia, Conner, and Toko smiled; she nodded, too shaken by her sickness to talk, then sat back in the tough plastic seat as they shot upward. The Empire State Building emerged from the rain clouds, lights flashing red to signal a state emergency. The National Guard was hot and heavy on the streets, informing everyone the government falling didn’t mean no one was in control.
Large aerial billboards moved below her, advertising the next season of RoBusters. Alice thought of Jeanie, her neighbor. That show had been their favorite, episodes still on her Box waiting for Alice to join her for noodles. Alice had checked; Jeanie went into an upstate clinic and never came out, her questionnaire a death warrant.
The FBI had arrested Harper’s cabinet, and other members of the Ghost Committee, on charges relating to the Six-Thirty bombing. However, it hadn’t been that, or the extermination camps, that brought down the government. No, it had been the killing of Xavi that started the avalanche. Julia’s footage of their final confrontation had stuck in the nation’s consciousness—Xavi’s body falling backward in a cloud of blood repeated endlessly on news channels. The elite, so prone to changes of allegiance, had decided it was the government’s turn to face justice.
Alice couldn’t do anything for the victims of Arizona except fight to make the truth known. Julia had been asked to present her findings to the UN in an open session, and the main exhibits would be the Walbrook Meeting minutes. It was one thing to see murder in freeze-frame, it was another to read about the deaths of millions hidden behind bland HR script. The document Julia had found took only moments to read but would take Alice the rest of her life to understand.
She called up the file and reread it as the Hopper flew on:
Top Secret / 16th copy: The following persons took part in the discussion about the successful answer to the unemployment question, which took place in Walbrook, MA, on 20 January 2047:
1. Rebecca Harper, President of the United States
2. Charles Takamatsu, CEO Cortex
3. Mark Rothmore, CEO Insight
4. John Brancato, Director, Homeland Security
5. Mark Simat, Director, National Health Questionnaire Bureau
6. Ben Avila, Director, Department of Employment
7. Dr. Bühler, Secretary of State for System Wide Integration
1. At the beginning of the meeting, Brancato, Director of Homeland Security, reported that the president had appointed him delegate for the preparations for the successful answer to the unemployment question.
Secretary of State Dr. Bühler gave a short report on project progress so far; the essential points being the expulsion of the unemployed from every aspect of American life.
In carrying out these efforts, an increased acceleration of the emigration of the unemployed to the off-world system was started, being the only current solution.
By order of the president, a Central Office for Unemployed Emigration was set up in January 2052, and the Department of Homeland Security was entrusted with the management. Its most important tasks were:
a) to make all necessary arrangements for the preparation for an increased emigration of the unemployed.
b) to direct the flow of emigration.
c) to speed the procedure of emigration in each individual case.
2. The CEO of Cortex, Takamatsu, explained the limitation of transmission technology and outlined the time required to upload all three hundred million people proposed.
3. For the time being, emigration has been tolerated on account of the lack of other options. Emigration is not only an American problem, but also a problem for the planets/moons to which emigrants are being directed. Financial difficulties, such as the demand by various governments for increasing sums of money, the lack of arrival space, increased restriction on materials necessary for resettlement, and other such issues, have increased extraordinarily the difficulties encountered. In spite of this, 537,000 unemployed were sent off world during Phase 1. However, the ongoing and increasing financial demands by the outer system make this delivery method nonviable longterm.
4. Another possible solution has now replaced emigration, i.e. the evacuation of the unemployed to Arizona.
New York and Los Angeles will be handled first due to social and political necessities; after that the ill, or those over 65 years old, will be dealt with in local medical camps where the successful answer can be carried out.
The government-issued questionnaire will be used as a primary source of information in determining who requires shipment to Arizona, and who is dealt with at city of residence.
The beginning of the individual larger evacuation actions will largely depend on military developments and is pending further review.
All the undersigned approve and are in accordance with these meeting minutes.
The language chilled Alice—ordered, calm, lethal. The state-sponsored elimination of three hundred million people outlined in a few lines of text. After the memo’s release, a national emergency had been announced, the military taking direct control, using laws passed by the Harper administration.
A new election had been called, but it didn’t matter; the union was broken beyond repair, the center disintegrating. The United States had fallen, drowned under the weight of the unemployed. Everything Harper predicted had come to pass but by her own doing, not that of the hopeless millions.
“Are you all right?” Julia asked.
“I just met Barlow,” Alice said.
“You did?” Julia leaned forward, frowning. “Where? We tracked you the whole way down. You were alone the whole time.”
“I’m not sure, but he looks like bad news. We need to deal with him fast if this is going to work. Toko, which is the toughest gang left in New York?”
“The New York Police Department has the greatest manpower and equipment,” he replied, voice low and deep. He held out a new badge to her. It gleamed in the subdued lighting. “I promised you a new one. Alice, you are now officially back on the force.”
She looked at it. She’d wanted this for so long, to be back, yet it felt worthless to her now. A job didn’t define her, her family and actions did. She tossed it back to him. “Conner, will Five Points work with the NYPD?”
“Oh for sure. I met the captains and reintroduced Julia. They get it. Joining forces is the way to go. The meeting with the
other families is on for next week.”
“Four, you ready?”
“Yes, dear. All twelve of us agree to your terms and conditions.” The MI’s voice ghosted from a small speaker in the flight console.
“So, what now?” Julia asked.
Alice looked out the window as rain streaked across the armor glass. She peered down at the crowds milling around emergency vehicles distributing food and water. It wasn’t enough. She’d saved millions; now she was responsible for them.
“Isn’t it obvious?” she said. “We take over.”
THE END
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jim Keen is the author of the breakout Cortex series. After a career as an architect and illustrator he now makes his home at www.jimkeen.com. You can connect with him on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/jimkeenauthor/ on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/jimkeenauthor and email him at [email protected] if the mood strikes you. He reads every email!
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CONTACT BINARY
Chapter One:
NEW YORK, JUNE 2nd, 2052
Wind roar grew as the truck accelerated to its two-hundred-mile-an-hour speed limit and settled into a steady cruise. The cargo vessel reeked of industrial antiseptic—bitter, acidic chemicals that made Susan lightheaded. Conner stood to her left, hands in the pockets of his bulletproof thrasher jacket, as Nikkei turned and drew his gun.
“Put that away before I hurt you,” Susan said, voice calm despite the adrenaline pouring through her system.
Nikkei’s small chrome pistol reflected the truck’s interior as it tracked her movements. Its laser-targeting system refocused on her eyes, the needle-thin actinic light making her blink. “No, I don’t think I will,” he said and turned to Conner, face pinched and white. “She’s the rat, brother. You must see that.”
An ugly CWS Beretta hung from Susan’s belt, but Nikkei was so amped he’d likely start firing if she reached for it. She looked for another weapon, but the vehicle was an autonomous drone with no cabin, windows, or doors. A dark gray composite formed curved walls and roof, the material’s weave just visible through layers of oily filth. Racks of reprinted limbs hung from the ceiling, body parts silhouetted inside translucent plastic sacks. The only illumination came from the sack’s algae-green glow, twin red emergency lights by the rear door, and the tablet’s blue screen.
“Grown some balls at last, eh?” Conner said in his southern drawl: ayt layst, eyuh? “I do strongly suggest you take a moment before making such a serious accusation.” He flexed his shoulders, jacket hiding the hand cannon’s bulk. A lane change sent all three of them staggering left, the sacks swinging in the tight space.
Nikkei tried again. “Conner, listen to me. Five Points’ encryption is secure. It has to be an organic leak, and she’s the only variable.”
“A rat explains a whole universe of things, but so would system infiltration.” Conner smiled, but his eyes were cold and hard.
“Don't be an idiot. I know you’re sharing her bed, but that doesn’t make me wrong about this.” Nikkei searched for a light, friendly tone. He failed.
Conner lifted the hand cannon from his pocket. The old, heavy gun glittered in the dim light. Susan had shot a few drones with it on their first date, and the damn thing nearly broke her wrist. As Nikkei stared at Conner, she flicked her Beretta to On; its centrifuge spun up with a mechanical whir just audible over the road noise.
“Put the itty-bitty pop gun back in your pocket, and let’s talk this out.” Conner didn’t shout and was all the more menacing for that.
No one spoke. The truck rattled, electric motor whining like a bandsaw below them.
“Ten minutes to delivery,” the tablet said in a creamy British accent.
This Automatic Eden References
The NY questionnaire, and the Walbrook meeting minutes, are abbreviated and adapted versions of the Nazi’s T4 medical questionnaire, and the Wannsee Conference Minutes.
The questionnaire was used by the Third Reich to determine those “unworthy to live,” beginning with sick children. From autumn 1939, “malformed and idiotic children” were killed in special “children’s wards.” Shortly afterward, the killing of adult asylum patients started.
These hospitals acted as prototypes for the death camps. The operation was called T4, after the address of the euthanasia front organization at Tiergartenstraße Four in Berlin.
More here: http://holocaustonline.org/medical-system/t4-program/
The Wannsee Conference took place on January 20, 1942, and the minutes, in their entirety, are available online. The horror behind bland bureaucratic language is worth reading, though it is hard to sleep afterward. More here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wannsee_Conference
Copyright
A Transmission Digital LLC ebook.
Ebook first published in 2020 by TRANSMISSION DIGITAL
Copyright ©️Jim Keen 2020
All rights reserved.
All the characters in the book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
Contents
Contact Binary
I. Obsolescence
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
II. The Streets
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
>
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
III. Phase Change
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
IV. Interlinked
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
