A User's Guide to Make-Believe

by Jane Alexander

  It should all turn out alright, thanks to him. Probably. Almost definitely. And when it did, it would be thanks to his foresight. He wasn’t superstitious, didn’t believe in signs; coincidences were just that. But four years ago, when he’d seen the girl waiting in the office to be called in for interview – straight away, he had known her. His most recent visit to Raphael House, she’d been there too. An uncomfortable moment. But easy enough to find out who she visited there. What the relationship was, or had been. And once he was sure she wasn’t an investigative journalist or an industrial spy, he’d recognised her potential as either a threat or an asset – and it had been his decision to act, to hire the girl. She was competent enough, after all, might possibly have made it to second interview without his interference. The idea was to keep her close enough to monitor any suspicions she might have – he couldn’t claim to have foreseen at that stage exactly how they would use her, and admittedly when the spontaneous connections had started it had seemed for a while that she might be more trouble than she was worth. But again he’d acted to neutralise her. Made sure the terms of her dismissal were suitably severe.

  And now when they needed someone to deliver the upgrade, there she was. Persuadable. Expendable. The perfect tool for the job. There were other addicts, of course, other users who’d been terminated – but none who had signed a draconian contract they could be persuaded to breach. There was simply no one else like the McAllister girl, no one about whom they knew so much. Information was power, made it quite straightforward to persuade someone round to your point of view, especially when they were unaware of quite how much information you held. And once she had been facilitated back into Make-Believe, she’d not only shown that her biomolecular network was still in working order, she had demonstrably contravened the terms of her dismissal – giving him all the leverage he needed.

  So when they turned this situation around it would be down to him – not this plain civil servant with all her watchful, invisible power. Without Cassandra McAllister, what other options would they have? Still, useful to have her here, this woman. Useful to have a female. Chances were the girl wouldn’t even have opened the door to Lachlan and another man.

  He glanced behind him once again. God, look at her. Sweat glittering on her face. Skin white as death. Hair like she’d just come out of the rain. She was sweating into his jacket; he’d have to get it cleaned again, what a ball-ache. Last thing he needed in this morning’s meeting with Eric was a jacket that stank of fear. He rubbed a hand across his eyes, wishing he was home, asleep, not trapped in a car sunk nose-deep in trees outside a madhouse in the arse-end of nowhere. Christ …

  He let his eyes close for just a moment, and leant back in his seat.

  Twigs tapped the windshield, shifting in a gentle breeze. Somewhere, a bird sang.

  The driver’s side window sighed as it opened a crack, letting the fresh air in. The advisor angled her mirror to see more clearly.

  She had witnessed it happening before, inside the hospital, had filmed the clinical trial subjects for her confidential reports – but to watch it in the back seat of her car … She could actually smell the girl, the sweat coming off her, bitter and sharp. The contrast between this, and what the research had promised. It was fascinating, in a way.

  When she’d been drafted in to help achieve a satisfactory resolution to this enormous fuck-up, she’d gone back through it all. The paperwork, the meeting transcripts. The researchers had been eloquent in their requests for funding, for approval. Professor Fiona Morgan, pressing her case. Explaining how the technology would revolutionise the treatment of mental health. Make it possible for psychiatrists to intervene directly, from inside a patient’s consciousness. Help individuals to reframe their experiences, to filter the information they received from the world around them, to make sense of that information. That phrase she had used, the single phrase that had caught the Minister’s attention: perfectible minds.

  In the mirror, the girl slid to one side, fell half out of sight.

  Perfectible. In her opinion, not that she was paid to have an opinion, you could trace it all back to that word. The regulatory approval, the lack of ethical oversight. Perfectible equals productive equals efficient. An efficient response to the mental health crisis, that’s what the Minister had bought into. Very keen altogether on efficiency, this lot, and her Minister in particular. She wouldn’t use the word ‘corrupt’, wouldn’t go that far, not quite. Opportunistic … perhaps. Myopic, evidently.

  Too close beside her, Oswald creaked in his seat. She wished he’d sit still, stop fidgeting. She wondered if he knew why he was there, really, instead of his boss. Of course it would hurt Imagen to lose their CTO, if it should come to that, but as she understood it there were several extremely capable technology officers under him. He was not irreplaceable – the company would survive his ignominious departure, if that was what it came to. And the decision had been taken, not by her naturally, that – in the interests of the department, the government, the national economy – the company would survive.

  Oswald twisted to look at the girl, creaking leather again. ‘Enough, now?’ he said.

  She tilted the mirror further. The girl was leaning with her head pressed against the glass, neck awkwardly angled. Under her lids, her eyes were still jumping. 05.25 glowed on the dashboard.

  Personally, she’d have been more thorough, left it as long as they could – till the hospital subjects started to wake. She sighed, turned the ignition, began to reverse. Oswald was probably right. They wanted her compliant, after all. Not ready to be sectioned. Well … not yet.

  FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

  Q. Can everyone use Make-Believe™?

  A. We want everyone to experience their own amazing virtual reality! You can use Make-Believe™ as long as:*

  • you are over eighteen

  • you have passed our health, credit and security checks

  • you are not pregnant or trying to become pregnant

  • you are not currently undergoing, and have not previously undergone, treatment for any mental illness or neurological condition

  * For more details, see our full terms and conditions.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Light – there is light, there is – a scream, she tries to – she is dying, her heart, can’t breathe, can’t breathe— Reaches out, hits something close in front – too close – hits again, punching, get away – but it’s not, it’s just— Leather. Soft. Seat, car seat. Her neck wedged, cornered. The glass, trapping her. She scrambles up, upright. Retches. Christ, she’s not going be sick. Glass drops away. Outside! Do it outside! Bitter spasms. She coughs. Burning. Like her skin, her skin had. Flayed. Acid. She shakes. Teeth hammer. Bile in her mouth. She wipes her chin, his jacket. Done? The window rises. Her head against it, sweat-wet skin, cool glass. Water. She wants to drink. To be under the water. Cleaned. The water to flow through her, and her to live there, gilled, breathing, clean.

  The shaking passes. Empties her. Leaves her slumped.

  They were taking her somewhere. They were taking her away: yes, and she wanted it, to be away from here. A broken doll in the corner – who was it, lying there? Knew it was her, was herself – but no, not really she wasn’t. Was not anything. Didn’t feel. Only the prickling numbness across her cheeks, lips, nose. Only pity, for the doll in the corner. Pity was abstract. Was nothing. Look, Oswald’s jacket. He would be angry. She touched it, fingers thick and bandaged, the jacket smooth, hard, like glass, like the window.

  She was noticing, now. Something had fallen from her ear. It lay on her lap, the receiver. She picked it up, turned it, staring. Scrap of titanium, silicon, graphene.

  Oswald spoke. ‘You’re going to do what we asked?’

  She turned her head towards the glass. It was too much effort to reply. Like expecting her to lift a mountain. She decided not to listen. Closed her eyes.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  When the car stopped Cassie prised her eyes open,
blinking at the light. She thought she knew it, this place. The car park, the box-buildings, low and new. She had been here – had she been here?

  The woman spoke. ‘You’ll look after the rest of it.’

  Without answering, Oswald got out of the car. Stepped round, and opened the rear door. ‘Come on, Cassandra, come with me.’

  No: she didn’t want to. Wanted to sleep. Lie down on this comfy seat, close her eyes. Become nothing. But he promised she could have a bath, after. Said they would take her home. Bath. Bed. Sleep. And besides, if she stayed in the car she’d be left with her. So she pushed herself along the seat, and out.

  The second the door slammed, the woman pulled away. Didn’t look back.

  ‘She is a bitch,’ Cassie said. She was feeling loose, now, like nothing much mattered.

  ‘This way. The sooner it’s done the sooner we get you home.’

  ‘Isn’t she? Don’t tell me you like her. Is she high up, she must be higher up than you? That must be a real … a real pain in the arse.’ The distance to the ground was hard to judge. She walked carefully, following Oswald, not looking any further than the heels of his black, shiny shoes. They were crossing tarmac, and then they were at an entrance, a plain black door in a featureless breeze-block wall. She waited, unsteadily upright, as Oswald keyed in a code, palmed the security panel, stood staring for an iris scan.

  Then the door released with a click, almost inaudible, and they were in.

  Along corridors lit by blue-tinged emergency lights. Oswald keyed and palmed through layers of security. He talked as they walked, but not to her. ‘I’ve got the subject here,’ he was saying, ‘but there’s some paperwork to complete first. Have everything ready, will you?’ There was a tinny response from someone, before Oswald cut in again: ‘Then I can’t see how ten more minutes is going to make a difference, is it? Do your job.’

  Cassie stumbled after him. Down corridors, round corners, deeper into the core of the building. Finally he led her into an office, a cupboard-size space cluttered with tower drives, screens and filing cabinets, just enough room left over for a desk and a single chair. Turned on the strip light.

  ‘Sit, please.’

  Cassie did as she was told.

  Oswald pushed aside a stack of folders, clearing a foot of space on the desk; he opened his briefcase and drew out a sheaf of paper. ‘Our new agreement,’ he said. ‘This updates – replaces – the previous version. Three copies; we need your signature on each of them.’ He placed the papers in front of her. ‘Read them, and when you’re ready—’ He drew a fat silver pen from the case, laid it alongside. ‘It’s exactly what we discussed earlier, so there shouldn’t be any questions.’

  Cassie lifted the top copy. She recognised letters, words, even parts of sentences, but there was no meaning attached to any of it. She ran her eyes along the lines, pretending to read. Oswald stood over her, arms folded. Halfway down the first page, she flipped to the next. It must be obvious she was acting; she wasn’t sure why she was playing along. She skimmed to the last page. It could have said anything. She might have been signing away her firstborn. But there was no choice. What had happened to her, back there – she couldn’t think of it happening to not-Alan. Happening every night of his life.

  The pen was heavy in her hand as she twisted off the lid. Last time she’d signed their papers, they hadn’t lent her a gold-nibbed fountain-pen. Perhaps her signature needed to be more weighty, more certain this time around. She looped her name, thick and black. Once. Twice. Three times.

  ‘Well done,’ said Oswald. ‘An excellent decision; I’m sure you won’t regret it.’ The poor salesman in him, overenthusiasm pushing back to the surface. She added the date. Dropped the pen on top of the papers, pushed the lot towards Oswald, who handed back one copy. ‘You keep this. Two for me, one for you. Now we’re getting there – aren’t we? Follow me, please.’

  More walking, and again the feeling of a dream; she was lost, shuffling in circles, she would never get out of here. All she wanted was to stretch out on the cold hard floor of the corridor. It would feel like a feather bed, pulling her into sleep. But she kept upright, kept moving. Oswald was walking-and-talking again, but this time he was addressing her. ‘Once we’ve administered the upgrade, it’ll take a day to prime your network,’ he told her. ‘Essentially, it’s rewriting the instructions for every biomolecule. Within twenty-four hours, we’ll be ready for you to connect to Make-Believe again. We’ll want to spread the upgrade as widely as possible during your week as an active carrier, take you to a number of strategic places where you can pass it on.’ He stopped, faced her. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said, ‘it’ll be nothing like this morning. A series of brief connections, all managed with the receiver so we’ll remain in control. And that will be it: you’ll have carried out your side of the agreement.’ He turned away, palmed a security panel, and opened the door to another, much bigger room.

  ‘Hello?’ he called, into silence.

  They were in a laboratory, a dim scrubbed space. One set of strip lights marched brightly across a tiled ceiling; three more sets slept undisturbed. On the far side of the lab, a door opened, and a slight figure appeared – a boy, a teenager, short-haired in white shirt and dark trousers, but then the boy spoke and Cassie realised she was a woman.

  ‘Come through,’ she called.

  They walked past a repetition of benches – some stacked with unexplained machines, shrouded for the night like birds in cages, some holding glass cases like fish tanks that reflected the pale smears of their faces. The floor was dark, swarming with flecks of colour. Cassie blinked, trying to stop the colours buzzing as she navigated the space, following Oswald into a room so filled with equipment there was barely space for three people to stand. The woman was shrugging into a lab coat. Close up she didn’t look boyish at all; she looked pretty. Tired, but pretty.

  ‘Everything’s ready,’ said the woman. She gestured towards a stainless-steel trolley laid out with medical-looking paraphernalia, unidentified things sealed in sterile packets. ‘Has been since yesterday evening …’ She covered her mouth, gave an exaggerated yawn and shot Oswald a resentful look. Then she seemed to notice Cassie for the first time, and her eyes narrowed.

  ‘Hello,’ she said. ‘Looks like I’m not the only one who’s been up all night.’

  Beneath Cassie’s feet, the floor was tilting like the deck of a boat.

  ‘Here.’ The woman grabbed a chair, spun it round behind Cassie in a single neat movement. ‘Have a seat; we’ll not be long. I’m Sam, by the way, nice to meet you.’ Then she took hold of Oswald’s arm, drew him over to the doorway.

  ‘What’s the story?’ Sam’s voice was low, but the room was small, and Cassie could hear her clear enough.

  ‘You don’t need the story,’ Oswald said. ‘That’s not your job, is it?’

  ‘It doesn’t have to be my job, it’s just … human concern. Come on, she’s out of it. What’s happened to her?’

  ‘She’s fine. She’ll be more fine once we can get her home, so let’s get on with it.’

  ‘It’d be better to bring her back later, do it another time.’

  ‘No. We’ll go ahead now.’

  ‘But look at her. Look at the state of her. I really don’t think—’

  ‘We’ll go ahead now.’

  There was a pause: a momentary stand-off. Then Sam turned away. She moved back to her trolley, rearranged a stack of what looked like sterile dressings so they were absolutely straight.

  ‘Alright,’ she said to Cassie. ‘Let’s get this over with, shall we, and then you can get home. We’ll just give your face a wash first, and maybe get that hair tied back. There’s a bathroom back this way. I’ll show you.’

  Through the lab, across the corridor, into the ladies’. Sam ran a basin full of hot water and hand soap, paddled it with her hand to bring up the bubbles.

  ‘That soap’s a bit rough for your face, I know, but we do need to get you cleaned up,’ she said.
<
br />   Cassie dipped her hands in. Brought them up to her face, and sluiced. She was aware of heat, water, pink perfume, all of it distant, as if the face she was washing belonged to someone else, as if she herself was comfortingly absent.

  Sam held out a bundle of paper napkins. ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘He’s my boss.’

  Cassie dried her face, her neck. Shook droplets of water from Oswald’s suit.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Sam, ‘I like the jacket.’

  In the mirror, Cassie’s gaze slid sideways from her wrecked reflection, till she caught Sam’s eye. Nice of her to be concerned. To want to not do what Oswald wanted – even if she was going to do it anyway. ‘It’s OK,’ Cassie told her. ‘I have to. I’ve signed the papers.’

  A frown creased Sam’s forehead. ‘I don’t know about anything – I’m just here to make sure this gets done right,’ she said. ‘Come on, then. You look like you need your bed more than I do, so let’s crack on.’

  Back in the small room, Cassie did as she was told. She sat on the reclining chair that took up most of the floor space. She stretched her legs in front of her, leant back against the headrest. The disposable cover smelt slippery, medical. A curtain hung at the side, ready to form a semi-private cubicle, but Sam didn’t draw it round.