Ronin

by Tony Bertauski

  There were still spots on his forehead where the wires had been attached, but the gray flesh had already become rosy. He was beginning to thaw. He yanked a holographic panel out of the interstellar data projection. Waving his hand, the panel rotated through a series of photos—faces, names and personal information.

  Ryder was still frozen. “What’s happening?”

  “My manners are lacking,” he said, “but time is short, one sees. A very small window to do what we need. You dreamed our story, Ryder Mack. That much is true.”

  Gallivanter looked over his shoulder. A bright eye peered through a thicket of white hair.

  “Dream?” Ryder shook his head.

  “Our story.”

  I can’t dream a story. But here he is, the one from the dream.

  “I’m still dreaming,” he muttered. It was the only explanation. Elven were fantasies. And so are flying reindeer.

  “You are not,” Gallivanter said. “My body has been asleep, but I have not. I have been awake a very long time, Ryder Mack.”

  Ryder remembered seeing the energy pulse through the conduit on the ceiling. Was he talking about BG’s mind interface? The little discs that were used in the introspection could read thoughts. BG was using the same technology to monitor the elven while he was in cold storage, the wires on his head reading his thoughts. Gallivanter had simply reversed the flow. Instead of BG taking his thoughts, Gallivanter had connected with the computer network. He’d sent the messages.

  He was in the computers.

  “Limitations, there were,” the elven said. “I could only go so many places, do so many things without a body. Even with the help.”

  Gallivanter wagged a finger at the computer he was on. Something stirred behind them. Rolls of wrapping paper fell off a shelf, golden bells and green holly leaves on one side. A drone hovered out of a cabinet. Ryder’s heart shrank. But the drone didn’t aim its blinking green eye at him. It grabbed a gadget off the table and delivered it to Gallivanter.

  Even with the help.

  He had been controlling the drones, shutting them off and looping the footage in the early morning hours. They’d given the phone to Cherry. And delivered the messages.

  Gallivanter fitted the gadget on his hand and pushed the holographic profiles to the side then pulled open a new set of data. A string of light bathed him in eerie red light. New connections were made. One of the profiles expanded.

  Billy Big Game.

  “His obsession began on the Pole.” Gallivanter continued working. “He stumbled onto me, he did. I take the blame for that, careless. It wasn’t the first time I had been seen, but captured. That was.”

  Gallivanter flung more profiles, images of boys and girls standing with their arms at their sides. It was them, the naughties and the nicies. A list of data was attached to each one of the images.

  “Very unfortunate, his background in biology. My knowledge unlocked secrets to synthetic life. He used that, you see. He used that.”

  Figgy was an old dog in the dream when BG had first captured Gallivanter. That wasn’t a different dog later on, but it was younger. BG didn’t heal her. He put that old and tired dog in the cooler.

  After he copied her.

  Those weren’t MRI machines. They were building new bodies. BG wasn’t limping when he came out. Soup didn’t have a hearing aid. They were better versions of themselves.

  Nice.

  “They don’t know what they are, they don’t. They have memories of childhood, they believe they grew up, their memories tell them. They believe they are exactly who they have always been. But they just woke up, they did.”

  “Why?”

  “He wants good boys and girls—”

  “To do what he wants.”

  Gallivanter stopped what he was doing. “Cryogenically preserved, all of us. Even William is a perfect simulation of himself, one that he controls.”

  But BG’s original body wasn’t in the morgue like the others. His cell was empty. But everyone was there—Soup, Arf, Jane. All of them. Somewhere on the nicy wing their replications were sleeping; they would wake up with perfect teeth and that smell.

  Soup was right. They’re fake. They’re all fake. And now he is too and doesn’t even know it.

  Ryder fell into a chair. He could barely feel his legs.

  “This,” Gallivanter said, “is why we hide.”

  He continued changing the profiles, ending each one by highlighting a floating button that said sleep before going to the next one.

  Ryder walked across the lab and pulled back the curtain. Cherry was still sleeping. She didn’t look any different. Ryder leaned over and sniffed her hair. Smelled like incense.

  “The last ones,” Gallivanter called. “When he’s finished, he will put them in the box and take their clones to the Pole. That cannot happen.”

  She was warmer than normal. Her complexion looked clammy. He brushed her hair and felt her forehead and noticed the little button attached to her forehead. He was about to pluck it off.

  Gallivanter held up his hand. “Do not wake her.”

  Ryder was about to argue. If he pulled the button off, she wouldn’t be under the influence anymore. But she’d wake up and see all of this. Ryder was still standing, barely—maybe because of the dreams, because he already knew the story.

  The last ones.

  Ryder left her side. Gallivanter turned his back and didn’t see him step onto the silver disk next to him. He was immersed by the data and, unexpectedly, space seemed to expand. From the outside, it didn’t look any bigger than a shower stall or phone booth. Inside, the data space went on forever.

  He didn’t understand any of the symbols or how they were connecting, but the profiles were simple. That was what he wanted to see. Sleep was highlighted on the ones Gallivanter had already programmed. The others still said active. Wake was glowing. Ryder flipped through them, and Gallivanter didn’t stop him. He reached the very last profile.

  It’s me.

  He had awakened on the nicy wing after the mountain, after Ronin had been captured. He was asleep for almost a day. But nothing about him was different. His teeth weren’t perfect, his attitude was still bent. The reindeer kiss still on his cheek. His body wasn’t in cold storage.

  You’ve always been nice, BG had said.

  That was why he smelled nice. The first day he arrived at Kringletown, Soup and Arf could smell it. Ryder never noticed.

  Data scrolled next to his image, a record of when he slept and when he was awake, when he’d been good or bad. And his memories, they were there too. That was how Gallivanter did it. He uploaded the dreams into his awareness.

  ACTIVE, it said.

  He looked at his hands.

  “Was I not real?” Gallivanter said. “When I sent you dreams? When I sent you messages? Body, no body, I am who I am, as are you.”

  Ryder stepped out of the data. The sudden contraction of space caused the floor to shift. He stumbled to his knees and got up, woozy. I’m dreaming. I have to be still dreaming.

  “They will sleep and we will walk out.” Gallivanter held him steady. “I cannot do that without you.”

  The nicies were tucked into their beds. Gallivanter was about to put them in a deep state, like they had done to Ryder when they carried him off the mountain. They’d turned him off. Gallivanter was about to do the same thing, but one person was awake. The monitor showed an empty bed with the covers thrown back.

  BG was walking down the corridor.

  “I won’t leave her.”

  Ryder pulled away. He was going to pluck the button off Cherry’s temple and carry her out. If Gallivanter wanted his help, he wasn’t going to do it without her. He went to her side. The magnetic disc latched onto her like a magnetic leech.

  “Please.” Gallivanter was too far away to stop him. “We’ll come back, my promise. We’ll return for them, all of them. No one will be left.”

  “She helped you. She helped me! You’d still be in that drawer
if it wasn’t for her. You can’t do this.” His head was spinning. “We’re not leaving her.”

  BG was crossing the foyer and reading his phone. He seemed relaxed and oblivious to what was happening in the lab. There wasn’t time to argue, but Ryder wasn’t negotiating. He needed her to wake up for a lot of reasons. More importantly, he needed to make sure he wasn’t dreaming.

  Because elven don’t exist and reindeer don’t fly.

  Gallivanter glanced at the monitor where BG was nearing the elevator. Perhaps he understood what Ryder needed. Dreams or not, leaving Cherry behind was too much. He went to the table and touched the panel.

  Her eyes fluttered.

  She didn’t recognize the ceiling or the smell. Ryder knew that experience, of waking from black nothingness to reconnect with reality. Her nostrils flared. She struggled to understand where she was and how she got there. Where did time go?

  She saw the lab, the computers and the glowing data disk. And then the short, round elven with the puffy white hair and frayed beard braids. Gallivanter waited patiently. On the monitor behind him, BG had reached the elevator.

  He took her hand. “Trust me.”

  She stared helplessly as he helped her sit up and put her feet on the floor. Pins and needles shot up her legs. Ryder found her boots. Gingerly, she took a step. Gallivanter wobbled to the elevator.

  A sound went off.

  On the monitors, everyone was still asleep. BG was sprawled on the floor. A puddle of coffee crept toward his cheek. Ryder helped Cherry into the elevator. She moved slow and steady, mouth open.

  “Wait!” Ryder said. “I forgot my boots.”

  They were under the table where he woke up. Gallivanter groaned as he raced across the lab. On the way back, he stopped near the data disk to put them on. They couldn’t see what he was doing.

  “Hurry now,” Gallivanter called.

  “Coming.”

  He jumped on the elevator with the plastic ends of the laces tapping the floor. Just as the doors closed, he heard hissing in the cold room.

  Gallivanter didn’t recognize the sound.

  20

  The elevator went sideways.

  Cherry held onto Ryder. She wasn’t blinking. Gallivanter looked back with kind eyes. Barefoot, he wiggled long toes with tufts of white curly hair.

  “You’re...”

  Gallivanter nodded.

  She closed her eyes. A shaky sigh poured out of her. The elevator arced in an upward path. She leaned against the back wall and pinched the bridge of her nose.

  “How did I... where are we...”

  “A lot’s happened,” Ryder said. “We’re getting out.”

  The elevator slowed. The doors opened and Gallivanter waddled out. “Dress for cold,” he said. “I’ll meet you outside.”

  He was going in the opposite direction of the naughty wing, moving like an overwound windup toy wearing nothing more than a thin gown.

  Ryder grabbed Cherry’s hand and began running. She kept up, reluctantly. They turned onto the naughty wing and she stopped. He went to his room and started throwing on Arctic gear. He had the snowsuit zipped and was lacing the first boot when she finally followed.

  “There’s another suit.” He pointed. “Hurry.”

  She watched him tie the bootlaces. He was almost done and she hadn’t moved. “I remember talking to Jane,” she said. “She said they were ahead of schedule... and then... and then I was looking at you and, uh...”

  “Gallivanter. His name is Gallivanter.”

  “What’s happening?”

  “We have to go. Just put on the gear so we can...”

  The truth was he didn’t want to explain. If he thought about it, he would freeze up and stare at his hands like her. He had to keep moving, keep looking ahead. He would figure it out later. There wasn’t time to process, not now.

  Would there ever be?

  She wore a blank expression. She wasn’t moving until something made sense.

  He sighed. “BG knows how to copy us. That’s why Soup wasn’t wearing a hearing aid. It’s why nicies smell weird, something to do with synthetic cells. We start off as naughties and he turns us into nicies. Good girls and boys... remember that? He controls them.”

  Cherry turned away like a fish struggling to breathe air. She flexed her hands and stared. Just like he’d done.

  “You’re not one of them,” Ryder said.

  He didn’t tell her any more. She didn’t need to know what he was, and she didn’t ask. Keep moving.

  “Where are they?” she asked. “Where are the...”

  “The naughties? They’re asleep. We’ll come back for them, but we need to go.”

  He pulled on his cap and started unpacking gear for her, throwing the suit and coat on the bed, unlacing the boots. She moved like she’d just come out of cold storage, legs stiff and sluggish. He dressed her.

  “Are they all nice?” She swallowed. “The naughties?”

  “Almost. Gallivanter put them all to sleep.”

  “Then why are we hurrying?”

  He zipped up her coat and pulled her gloves on. The light on the barn had come on. It was still dark. The sun hadn’t risen yet. A round figure was waddling toward the barn. Ryder pulled the window open. Snow blew across the desk.

  “Where we going?” she asked.

  He didn’t answer that. They were leaving Kringletown. That was all he could think about. But they weren’t leaving before they went to the barn.

  ***

  Snow scrunched under Gallivanter’s broad, bare feet.

  Winter greeted the early morning with blustery breath; the elven’s thin shirt fluttered. Ryder and Cherry followed his wide trail, huddling against each other. When they reached the barn, Gallivanter hit the slick concrete and slid through the breezeway.

  He cut to a stop at the big barn door.

  By the time Ryder and Cherry caught up, he was balanced on his toes like a ballerina, standing almost as tall as them. He waved a pattern at the warehouse doors like a magician warming up. The weathered trim darkened in front of his hand, a panel Ryder had seen in the cold room, the same panel BG had touched when he put the elven in the wall.

  A black mirror oozed from the wood grain. A reflection of bushy white whiskers filled the square as Gallivanter put a finger on the surface. A lighted trail followed his markings, glowing like swaths of Northern Lights. The panel glowed green.

  The doors popped inward.

  A mixture of hay and wet hide exhaled from the dark. And a strange and familiar sound echoed.

  Wump-wump-wump-wump.

  Gallivanter hung his hairy toes over the entrance. A wide set of stairs led downward. Light beamed down from the rafters. A dusty floor led between high-walled enclosures with barred windows.

  Wheelbarrows, steel buckets and flat shovels were lined against the walls. Despite the smell of manure, they looked more like cells than stalls. He hopped down the steps.

  Something moved.

  Gallivanter shuffled across the gritty floor. Once again, he rose up on his toes. There was a black panel on a stall, but he didn’t trace it this time. He stood on his toes with his hands up and waited.

  A bright pink muzzle emerged through the bars.

  Nostrils flared, snorting. Sniffing. A mournful moan cried from the dark.

  “My boy,” Gallivanter whispered.

  Memories rushed into the room. Ryder reached for Cherry before he tumbled down the steps, but she was gone. Instead, he clutched a handful of course blankets. A cold floor was biting his cheek. He was toothless and tiny.

  And crying.

  Cheeks wet, he let loose a shrill cry. Wrapped in brown blankets, he couldn’t find words to help escape the cold. His desperation echoed in the hollow vacancy of a moving truck. A mournful moan answered from a distant rooftop. The thud of hooves approached. Snorting nostrils reached into the truck and tickled his cheek.

  The reindeer kiss.

  Ronin had abandoned his place at the fr
ont of the sleigh; he broke the rule not to intervene. There were exceptions to that rule.

  He made this one.

  Ronin had been abandoned. Left behind. Made fun of. He wasn’t going to let that happen again.

  The wet muzzle was on his cheek again. Pink and warm, almost red and hot. Ryder wasn’t an infant in the truck anymore. He stood in front of the cage, dark eyes looking through bars. Ronin was inside a tight enclosure, with wires attached to him. There was conduit on the walls.

  A moan shook the room.

  Ryder rubbed his nose and felt his knees turn to jelly. Eyes wet, cheeks warm and salty. His throat swelled with words trapped inside. Cherry was next to him. Rubbery lips tested her touch.

  A blaze of colors decorated the floor. Gallivanter was tracing the cage’s panel. The pattern glowed for several seconds then faded to black. He did it a second time and then a third time. Furry brows stitched together, he studied the room.

  The rhythmic thumping was coming from an enormous cubicle in the far corner. Ronin withdrew from the bars and vanished into the dark recesses, the pink snout barely visible.

  “What’s wrong?” Ryder asked.

  Gallivanter sprang like an Arctic fox, throwing himself sideways and rolling like a snowball gathering momentum on a mountainside. The barn doors clapped like a bear trap.

  The thwump of a spear gun echoed in the rafters.

  The unforgiving spike of a steel post sank into the floor. Willowy vines whipped from the top, tentacles shooting toward the bouncing elven. One by one, they snapped and wrapped around objects and fell to the ground—bound up with buckets and shovels.

  Gallivanter disappeared into the shadowy depths.

  Another spike stuck near Ryder’s feet. Straps suddenly whip-snapped around them, wrapping their ankles and wrists, winding around their waists. Additional bindings slithered up their backs and wound around their necks, scaly and cold.

  Ronin kicked the walls. The rafters shook.

  Ryder struggled. The binding strap tightened as he twisted. Cherry couldn’t breathe. Her eyes bulged.

  “Relax,” Ryder wheezed. “Don’t fight.”

  When she stopped flailing, she drew a deep, trembling breath. Slow and easy, he reached out, careful not to stress the binding around his wrist, and found her hand. She closed her eyes and focused.