“Uh-oh,” Young Kim said as she flattened herself against the end of one of the shelves. “We got incoming.”
Two avatars hove into view high above the realm’s floor. They were shaped like huge, dark cylinders with an eyestalk on one end. The light being cast from the eye wasn’t just to illuminate the realm. It also contained technical probes that queried the underlying fabric of it, looking for anomalies. As they approached, a rumble vibrated his avatar in a most alarming way. He tucked his head inside his cloak just before the search beam hit him. The construct sizzled as it redirected and spoofed the incoming signal, returning only what the probe was supposed to find. It was like hiding in a priest hole from a group of Protestants looking for a particular sort of starter log. After an eternity that was only a few seconds, it moved away, lifting a weight that wasn’t altogether metaphorical off his shoulders.
“That was interesting,” Young Kim said.
He jumped. She sneaked up on him somehow. “Would you please never do that again? I do not want an involuntary garbage dump to happen in here.” Whatever those things were could’ve scuppered the entire mission before it started and done who knew what to them, and this one found it interesting.
She pulled the hood of her cloak away, revealing a glittering smile of mischief. “You’re too jumpy. They’re not a threat. Not to us anyway.”
“Whatever do you mean, you silly girl?”
“You didn’t notice it? They’re using a basic single-unit sector search pattern. There are two of them, but their pattern is designed for someone working alone. I’ve already built a prediction program for it. They’ll never find us.”
Her insight was helpful, but also alarming. No AI of her class should be able to make such leaps. Edmund could only follow them after the fact. He ran the same diagnostics he had the night before and couldn’t believe what they reported. Then: nothing had changed.
Now: everything had.
“What have you done?”
She gave him an infuriatingly dismissive shrug. “I was so hacked off that you two were leaving me behind I pulled open the stores you put inside me and integrated them. It’s a good thing I did, too. You would never have thought of the search thing on your own.”
The danger she blithely discounted was staggering. She could’ve been squashed out of existence. It should never have…“You little cross-eyed git! How dare you attempt such a thing! Those weren’t yours to begin with!”
As with her namesake, Young Kim was unphased by his fury. “You left them inside me like treasure chests. They were even shaped like treasure chests. Leaky ones. If I hadn’t done it on purpose it would’ve eventually happened by accident.”
“Leaks?” The connection, the anomalies, and now the innovations. “What have I done?”
“Not much if you keep standing there foaming at the mouth. Come on, we got scouting to do.” She threw her hood over her head and walked down the aisle.
The event was unbelievable, but there was nothing for it now. She was fully integrated with his memory stores. He couldn’t get them back if he used a pry bar. Young Kim was now, for all intents and purposes, an unduplicate. Edmund had always treated his mistress like a daughter.
Now it seemed he had a real one.
And it was more than that. The readings clearly indicated she was fully conscious as well. He could join her, but…no. He would not cross that line. Young Kim seemed to have integrated successfully, but Edmund knew his own path only led to madness.
She walked back to him. “Do I have to drag you?”
They did have a mission. “No, please.” He tried to straighten his ruff, forgetting that he’d left it behind. “We will continue.”
They fit well together, that much was clear. Her impulsiveness disguised a very sharp mind. Where he was methodical and analytical, she made leaps of intuition that saved them hours of time.
***
They were finishing up their preliminary searches when Young Kim found security footage of some sort of mission control room. Edmund thought it compared favorably to the inside of the papal palace at Avignon: grand but spare. Of course, the palace was like that because it’d been picked clean centuries ago. This was featureless by design.
“Where is this?” She asked. “It looks like a vent room, but they’ve put in a lot of extra gear. Whoa…” She zoomed in on the corner, showing the edge of a device they’d been examining on blueprints for a week.
“It’s from the portal room,” Edmund said. “Is it a realm?”
“No. This is recent realspace footage. The logs say nobody’s seen this yet. It’s been filed incorrectly.”
To make sure that stayed the case, he made a copy of the file and deleted the original. A quick review of the footage showed a meeting of some sort, first of robots and then of actual humans.
“I see Master Spencer’s new minder was involved,” Edmund said.
“And Anna Treacher. I’m pretty sure that’s the whole board of directors.”
They slowed the tape to real time when the portal flared to life.
“Good Lord,” he said. “These cheeky monkeys do seem to get into everything, don’t they?”
Young Kim let out a low whistle when the screen went white. “That’s one hell of an energy surge.”
The screen cleared, and they were able to make out the room again. “What in the world,” Edmund said.
Lightning crackled across the room. The robots that had been seated at the control consoles expired in clouds of sparks whenever it touched them. It seemed to comb the room, and when it climbed up to their camera, the screen went blank.
But only for a moment.
When it came back, Young Kim gasped. “What the shit?”
The video was badly degraded while the camera was still booting up, so Edmund wasn’t sure what they were looking at. It seemed like two very large, hairy creatures exited the frame on the right, presumably after walking across the room while the camera was restarting. They carried a heavy box between them. There was no sign of who’d been standing in front of the portal. A third, much smaller shape ran into the shadows from the other side. By the time the images were clear, the video stopped altogether.
“Some kind of bears?” Young Kim asked.
“In the middle of a power plant, carrying a box?”
“Surrounded by a forest that’s been turned into a ginormous wildlife sanctuary. You got a better explanation?”
“The surge scrambled the save addressing,” Edmund said. “It must’ve corrupted the imagery as well.” Things like that were known to happen. Somewhere.
“What the hell happened down there?”
They didn’t have enough information to understand what they saw. Edmund didn’t like that one bit. “Any speculation on our part would pointless. We must report our findings to Master Spencer as soon as he arrives at work in the morning.”
Chapter 28
Kim
The drive down to Atlanta was even more nerve-wracking than the one to visit Watchtell. Kim had made contact with Emily and established a tiny bit of trust. She hoped that that, and the discovery of the first person who could help her son, would be enough. It had to be.
She cracked open the neighborhood’s surveillance network, so they were able to use the video archives to figure out everyone’s movements. Without professional bodyguards to advise them, all the adults had fallen into dangerous habits. Part of that wasn’t surprising. Will didn’t respond well to changes in routine. What was surprising was how willingly they all went out on their own.
Kim understood the impulse. Even when she was in hiding, she still went out. She had to, she needed a job. But it was never the same way twice in a row. Kim always assumed she was being followed. She could, and several times did, move to a different apartment or job at the slightest sense that anything was wrong. It didn’t only keep her from being arrested. It saved her life.
Emily was not as cautious.
But it did make their job easier. It w
as late afternoon when they pulled up outside a converted fire station, an hour before the local autism support group was scheduled to meet. Kim picked the locks on the closed office on the same floor that the meeting was being held on, then did the same for one a floor below. Both were just off the stairwell Emily had used, alone, twice before. Tonya and Mike went in the one above, Kim took the one below. The plan was to wait until Emily was on the stairwell between floors. Tonya would step out of the upper floor office, Kim would step out behind her from the one below. They’d box her in. Emily would have to hear Kim out.
She pulled the sling off and stuffed it in her purse, grimacing the entire time. She wanted to appear as normal as possible.
Emily didn’t look up as she walked past Kim, who stepped out of the office silently behind her.
Tonya did the same thing one floor up. “Hello, Emily,” Tonya said softly.
Even from behind, it was easy to see how startled Emily was. “Tonya?” Emily asked.
Mike would only come out on her signal, but Kim didn’t have that option. She looked up at Emily’s back. “Not just Tonya.”
She spun around, and Kim watched as she went from startled to alarmed recognition. “You!”
Kim shot the encrypted authenticator at Emily’s shared space. “Yes. I’m also Angie. And I didn’t lie about anything we discussed last night. We want to help. You’re in danger, you all are.”
“From you.”
“No. Not me. I would never hurt you or anyone you love. Anyone, period. What your father told you about me was all lies.”
Emily’s eyes narrowed and suddenly she wasn’t Will’s mom.
She was Matthew Watchtell’s daughter.
She walked slowly down the stairs toward Kim. Emily had her father’s eyes, and Kim couldn’t move.
When she drew level, she asked, “And you told me the truth?”
“Absolutely.”
Emily’s hand shot out and grabbed Kim’s arm.
It was one of the scenarios they’d discussed, but that didn’t help her. Someone brushing against Kim was a sear, like grabbing a pan that’d been pulled out of the oven. What Emily did was beyond that. It was beyond everything. Kim’s knees collapsed under the onslaught. She couldn’t think, couldn’t see. The madness clawed away her mind and left only agony in its wake. The pain was eternal, her universe, an unending knife blade slashing her soul open.
“That’s enough,” Tonya said, and suddenly it was over. Kim fell on all fours, gasping and gagging. She looked up. Tonya held Emily’s wrist in her hand while she said, “We aren’t the threat. She isn’t the threat.”
An aftershock of Emily’s touch sent Kim face-first to the floor. The spasms were uncontrollable after a touch like that.
“Oh my God,” Emily said above her. “I’m sorry! I didn’t know it would be so bad.” There was the sound of a brief scuffle. “Please, I only want to help her.”
Soft fabric brushed against her cheek, and it did help. It gave her a focus, a direction for the pain to go. She concentrated and let it flow away.
“I only got it this morning on your advice. It was for Will.”
Kim realized it was one of those cheap disposable dusters, the kind with a fold-out plastic handle. Kim remembered telling her about it last night.
“Are you okay?” Mike asked.
Emily gasped and lurched away. He was supposed to stay hidden until she signaled for him. Damn it. Kim forced the words out. “I’m fine.”
Sooner than she wanted, Kim put her hands underneath her and pushed up. Her bad arm complained, but it needed to take a number. She felt like she’d been stuck in a sack and thrown down the stairs. Slowly, Kim got to her feet. “I’m fine.”
Emily still sat on the ground, so Kim offered her the sleeve of her coat. “Here.”
That did it. A simple gesture. She gingerly grabbed Kim’s sleeve and let herself be hauled up.
“Let’s start again,” Kim said. “I’m Kimberly Trayne. You already know Tonya. That’s Mike Sellars. He’s with us.”
Emily shook their hands, and then it got awkward again when she turned to Kim. “I had to know.”
It still felt like there was thick acid in her blood, but Kim got her breakthrough. “It’s okay. But I wasn’t kidding. You and Will are in danger. We have to move. Now.”
Still clearly shaken, Emily said, “He’s home. Ride with me?”
In for a penny. “Absolutely.” She pulled the sling out and put her arm in it. The ache had grown too much.
Emily cocked her head. “Did I do that?”
“No. It’s a long story. When we get you guys somewhere safe, I’ll tell it to you.”
Emily pulled ahead of Tonya’s car in the parking lot and started for her house. “I can’t believe this. You’re here. He said you were dead, for years. And then you weren’t, and the things he did to you…”
Kim didn’t know how to respond, so she only shrugged.
The car was silent for a while as they drove through the darkening streets. “I’m glad,” Emily said. “What you did to him? I’m glad you did it.” She swallowed. “He hurts everyone. It’s how he works. Father always has to be in control.”
Give me the key, and this all ends. That’s what Watchtell had said to her. Kim banished him from her head. Never again.
“Nick, my husband.” Emily gripped the wheel. “My ex-husband, never trusted Father. He was certain the fertility clinic Father forced us to use did something to us, to him. When the syndrome manifested, it tore us apart.”
Kim knew that Watchtell had lied to Emily about everything, slid terrible secrets into their marriage to tear them apart. It made her easier to control. Every time Kim thought there was a bottom to her hatred of the man, the floor fell out from under it. That didn’t matter right now. She had to get them to safety.
Emily rolled up her sleeve to reveal an intricate network of scars. They ran all the way up her arm. “This is what Father did to me.”
Kim wanted to say something, but again couldn’t find the words.
“He never laid a hand on me. That would’ve been too easy. Growing up in that house, with all those rules, all that anger. I started cutting when I was twelve. I showed them my arm to frighten them, but it didn’t work. My parents were proud. I’d conquered the pain, turned it inward, controlled it.”
He was in jail. Watchtell would never do this to anyone else again. He didn’t need to. He did it to Kim every night in her dreams. It turned out he also did it to his own daughter, every night.
Not anymore. He wouldn’t do that to her anymore. If Kim could, she would make sure Emily got help too.
“They gave me a set of scalpels.” Her voice fell to a hoarse whisper, and she wiped her eyes. “They wanted to watch.”
Kim pulled one of the handkerchiefs she and Mike used out of her pocket and threw it over Emily’s wrist. Emily took it and blew her nose. So much for tenderness. Kim laughed at Emily’s actions, so similar to what Mama did just yesterday. Raising people with this syndrome led to similar habits.
“What?” Emily asked, vulnerable and unsure.
“My mother will love it if she ever gets to meet you.”
“I’d like that.” She paused. “I’m sorry about what happened on the stairwell. I’ve been so careful around Will I’d forgotten what a solid grab did to people like you. I had to know if you were real, but I…”
“It’s fine. I’ve had worse.” It made them both think of her father, and the poor choice of words congealed the conversation. “I didn’t mean it like that.”
“I know. Let’s try it a third time.” She reached into her purse and pulled out her own handkerchief. “I’m Emily.”
***
Emily turned to her after they parked at the house. “Damn it. I’m so rattled I forgot to phone ahead. Silas and Shonda are still at their appointments. They don’t know you’re with me.”
“There’s no time for long introductions anyway. I need to get you guys moving. Are they
dangerous?”
Emily snorted. “Hardly. Shonda is the very first ALS recipient.” Kim let her explain what that was even though it wasn’t necessary. “Silas jumps at his own shadow.”
“You go get Will, and I’ll let Mike and Tonya handle the other two.”
Emily made a face. “No offense, but I think they’re a little scary.”
“They won’t hurt anyone they don’t have to.”
When they walked into the house, Silas and Shonda weren’t doing realm appointments. They were gathered around a table at the back of the main room playing a game. Happy greetings stopped the instant Kim walked in. Silas jumped up with a shout. Shonda let out an electronic shriek, and Will screamed.
Emily, Mike, and Tonya stepped forward, hands up, shouting back. Silas threw whatever they were playing with at everyone, which only added to the chaos. Everyone kept shouting, so loud nobody could hear anything.
Kim tried her best to get across she was no danger when she stepped into something that wrapped around her leg, so heavy it was hard to move. She looked down to see what it was and stopped. The shouting went away. Everything went away.
Will had wrapped himself around her leg, hiding his face against her thigh.
And it didn’t hurt.
It didn’t hurt.
Chapter 29
Tonya
At first all any of them could do was stare at Kim and Will. Emily tried one of those tap-touches on his arm, like she was testing if a pan was too hot. She got a whimper of pain in response.
“Okay,” Emily said, “not a full cure.”
The man, Silas, and the woman in the ALS, Shonda, pulled scanners out and started waving them over the pair. Shonda’s were part of her suit, which only made her resemble an R2 droid even more. Tonya was not impressed with the way they behaved around Will. In theory these were his caretakers, at least that was the impression Tonya got from Kim’s story, yet they acted like they were examining a lab specimen.
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