Chromed- Upgrade

by Richard Parry

  “No,” she said. “I don’t wonder. I don’t want to know.”

  “No,” said Mason. “Probably not. Goodbye, Carter.”

  “Mason, wait.”

  He held onto the link. Carter could be tracking him now, sending them to him, but he didn’t think so. “I’m still here.”

  “Do you trust me, Mason Floyd?”

  Mason sighed, the cabin small and empty around him. “Maybe,” he admitted. “What with?”

  “With your life,” she said. “Would you trust me with your life?”

  He tapped the steering wheel again, then pushed the van into a gap in the traffic. There was a snarl ahead, an accident causing people to drive like imbeciles. Would you trust me with your life? Mason sighed. “Yeah.”

  “Okay,” she said. “Here’s what you’ve got to do.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “You need to go where I can’t find you.”

  “I’m doing that,” he said. “Sex motel, remember?”

  “No,” she said. “I’m better than that. I’ll find you.”

  “You got a better idea?” he said.

  “Yes,” she said. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. I know a place.”

  “What kind of place?”

  “It’s the best kind,” she said. “It’s a place that doesn’t exist.”

  Mason drove through the night, surprised when the fingers of dawn tried to push through the rain. The van hummed along the old road, his overlay showing the route. He’d been running without headlights for a hundred klicks or so.

  A few hours back someone had hammered on the van’s internal privacy screen, maybe Haraway, but he’d ignored it and they’d stopped. Mason wanted to be alone for a while longer.

  The trees alongside the road were old, dead and blasted, twisted fingers eager to hold the clouds above. The ancient tarmac underneath the van was rutted and pitted. It was as if no one had been out here in a long time.

  It’s the best kind. It’s a place that doesn’t exist.

  The lattice pulled his hand, steering around a pothole, the van moving smoothly despite the speed. He checked the HUD, seeing the big numbers tick between 200, 201, and back again.

  “Mason,” said Carter.

  “Hey,” he said. “You can’t find me, remember?”

  “Yeah, that’s what I’m calling about,” she said. “Soon, I won’t be able to.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Do you know how to wire a place up?”

  “What?”

  “This place is off the grid, but … it’s got a sort of grid of its own.”

  “Okay,” he said. “That’s good?”

  “It might be. I’m trying to work out how to get in, but it’s … it’s old. Father Time’s never heard of it. It’s old, and it’s shitty, and I’m just—”

  “Carter.”

  Silence followed for a heartbeat, then, “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s going to be okay.”

  “How can you know?” There was something hard and frightened in her voice. “They’re right here!”

  The van bounced and jerked as he hit rubble on the road, the lattice kicking a little under his skin as he got the van back under control. “Carter?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Fuck ‘em, okay?” Mason looked at the coming dawn. “They’re an international cunt circus. Fuck those fucking motherfuckers.”

  She laughed, ragged at first, then long and clear. “I haven’t heard that one before.”

  “Yeah,” said Mason. “It’s about right, though.”

  Carter sobered. “I might not be at my best. I haven’t had a break in a while.”

  “Me neither. Still, my seat’s nice. Those Reed assholes have comfortable cars.”

  “The grid, Mason,” she said. “Remember the grid.”

  “What about it?” He thought he could see a structure in the distance, a smudge of black against the coming dawn. “I think I’m almost there.”

  “You’ve got a way to go yet,” she said. “The illegal?”

  “Bonus Round?”

  “Or Haraway,” said Carter. “Either of them.”

  “Either?”

  “See if they can help you. You don’t have to do this alone,” said Carter. “Find a store. Anything with tools. For working with cables, or wires.”

  “A store?”

  “There’s not much time left.” The link crackled and popped through Carter’s voice, cutting out for a second. “Mason?”

  “Yes?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “What for?” But the link was gone, lost and dead like the trees lining the road.

  Mason stood in the rain, hair plastered on his head. He hauled the van’s door open.

  “You motherfucker.” Bonus Round crouched in the doorway, her eyes wide as she looked around. “Sweet Jesus.”

  Haraway joined her, looking into the rain in the smudged light of dawn. “Mason, where are we?”

  “We got here off the two-forty. What was left of it.” He shrugged, looking at the rotted buildings that lined the road. No skyscrapers. Nothing but old, disused junk. “I passed a sign. Richland High School. So, I guess this is Richland.”

  “Where the fuck is Richland? I’ve never heard of it,” said Bonus Round. “Where is this place?”

  “Wait here,” said Mason. “I’ll get you something for the rain.”

  “You’re not covered,” said Haraway. “What about you? Where’s your helmet?”

  “Carter said they could track me through it,” said Mason, “so I left it about a hundred klicks back.”

  “You—”

  “Don’t sweat it, doc. It’s why they pay me the big bucks.” He walked through the rain, white boots crunching through fragments of gravel littering the road surface.

  It probably didn’t much matter. Dead from the rain, cancer, or from an Apsel bounty, dead was dead. He strode across the big wide street to a building that had the look of a general store, door hanging free of its hinges. Mason picked it up, grit sloughing free. He tossed the door inside, stepping after it.

  Water dripped at the back of the store. The floor was rotted, and mold crawled up the walls. Paradise. Mason stepped through the aisles. Most shelves had fallen, but a few still held goods ready for sale. No looting. Plenty here worth taking. What happened to the people?

  He found a rack of cheap umbrellas, plastic sleeves wrapped around the metal frames. He smiled at the color options, picking three out, all the same. Mason gave a last look around. He thought a figure shambled at the back, but it was gone when he blinked.

  That’s not ideal.

  He walked back to the van, handing the umbrellas out. The girl turned hers over like it was a snake, unsure what to make of it.

  “What shit is this?” said Bonus Round. “This the only color they had?”

  Haraway looked like she wanted to take charge. “I hardly think—”

  “No, probably not,” said Bonus Round. She pulled the sleeve off her umbrella, opening it. Its pink canopy arched above her.

  “It’s very you,” said Mason. “It goes nicely with—”

  “Go fuck yourself, company man,” she said. “Pink? Really?”

  The girl looked at Bonus Round’s umbrella then back to her own. Haraway reached down, pulling the cover free. “Like this, Laia.”

  “Laia?” said Mason.

  “It’s her name,” said Haraway. “The language pack.”

  “Right.” Mason crouched in front of the girl. “You’re Laia?”

  “Yes,” she said, then looked at Bonus Round’s back. “Sadie says you’re an asshole.” Her accent was thick, like she came from a Latin country. Spanish, maybe Italian.

  Mason looked over his shoulder at Bonus Round. Sadie, huh? “She did, did she?”

  “Yes.” Laia looked into his eyes. “It’s inside you.”

  Mason stood, taking a step away from the girl. “What is?”

  Laia looked at th
e clouds, holding her hand out to the rain. “The demon. It’s inside you.”

  “I—”

  “She doesn’t make a lot of sense,” said Haraway. “It’s like she’s speaking English fine, but doesn’t know the right words.”

  Laia touched the collar at her throat. “Can you get this off?”

  Mason looked closer at the collar. It looked like a couple hicks hammered it out of spare steel. “Maybe. I’ll need some tools.”

  “Hurry,” said Laia. “Hurry, or the demon will eat your soul.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  This was the most comfortable cage Laia had ever been in. The walls were smooth, beautifully made, and the floor was lush, like the finest garments. That was if you ignored the hole in the middle where one of the women used a weapon of impossible power.

  While they couldn’t get out, cages didn’t have weapons inside. Which meant this wasn’t a cage, but a carriage. The angel secured us inside to keep us safe. She’d never been in a carriage.

  Laia watched the two women with her. They were well fed and healthy. The one in black had been beaten, but her injuries looked recent. And beaten didn’t feel like the right word.

  She had been fighting. Neither of them walked with a limp or carried a cane. They hadn’t undressed, but if they had Laia was sure their backs would be free of lash scars. Laia wanted to be able to speak with them, to hear how one who was not a Master could carry her head high.

  How they could fight.

  They weren’t the only ones. The angel could fight. Before he’d put them in here, she’d seen the angel face down her master. His eyes had burned blue-white. Maybe the heavens were filled with warriors and asked mortals to join them when fighting injustice. Whatever was going on, Laia knew one thing.

  Her master wasn’t her master anymore.

  She wondered where Zacharies was. The angel had sent him away with another man, dressed impossibly fine, and they’d spoken words as if they’d known each other. Laia wondered what it would be like to know an angel and to speak with one. She’d been worried about Zacharies, but after thinking about it, she knew the angel wouldn’t have sent her brother off if there was danger.

  Would it? Laia had felt the thrill of fear when the carriage moved. It leaped forward, the speed of it pushing her to the floor. She’d felt pinned, the majesty of the heavens holding her still.

  You weren’t afraid of the carriage. Laia remembered the angel’s star-brilliant eyes. Who was she to think she could talk to angels? The prophecy only said the angel would save them, not how. Laia had sat on the floor, eyes wide, and watched the women speak with the angel. They were able to talk in its language. Laia couldn’t and felt fear because she wasn’t sure she’d be able to convince the angel to help.

  The woman with the black hair and blacker lips showed no respect. That was surprising. Were angels so common here? Was this Heaven or Hell?

  Perhaps angels were common here. A world free from injustice. Laia had seen so many strange things since arriving. Lights without fire. Men and women walking tall and free. Weapons of impossible power. And an angel.

  It’s all true.

  She remembered crystals falling with the rain as the angel fell, blazing a trail from above. He’d knocked her old master down before his will could be stolen. The angel was so fast, he could only be divine. He’d looked at Laia with eyes made of hard light, and she’d felt like he looked at her soul. Turned it this way and that and found her wanting.

  But he took me with him.

  Laia had forgotten her fear, remembering being led out through beautiful passages walled with the finest materials. Their surfaces had been smooth. Laia had trailed her hand across them, unable to find a seam or defect. But the passages hadn’t smelled right. They smelled old, dead, and rotten.

  Like the rain.

  At least that was familiar. So many strange things, like the wool floor of the carriage, and yet the stinking, vile rain poured from the sky as it did in her world.

  Whenever she tried speaking with the two women who shared the carriage with her, they hadn’t understood. The one with no respect had given her a smoking stick that tasted good but made her lungs burn, like the lamesh weed from the marshes.

  When the carriage stopped, the angel brought water, which the blond-haired woman had mixed with a powder. Laia had drunk it all, the taste something marvelous. And so sweet! When she’d been offered more a little while later, the carriage moving swift and sure around them again, Laia drank it all. It made her head feel heavy, her brain itchy, but not in an unpleasant way.

  She’d slept, exhaustion dragging her away. Laia didn’t know for how long, but when she woke light seeped in from the front of the carriage. Laia felt them slow, the change in speed what woke her.

  “I’m going to punch his lights out,” said the woman with the black clothes and blacker lips.

  I understand the language of the angels!

  The blond one frowned. “I wouldn’t recommend that. He’s not known for his tolerance.”

  “How many times have you been dragged from your home in the night?” Laia watched the woman’s black lips curl with anger.

  Tolerance. The word snagged at her mind, the itching behind her eyes coming back. She knew the word, but not the meaning.

  “What does tolerance mean?” Laia sat up, steadying herself as the carriage listed.

  “Now there’s a thing,” said the one with black lips. “She’s Spanish.”

  “She’s not Spanish,” said the blond, tossing perfect hair. “Her mouth isn’t used to making our sounds.”

  “I know how it works,” said the other one. “Christ, Haraway. I’m a musician, not brainless.”

  Haraway. A name, not a word. The blond woman was Haraway.

  Laia leaned forward. “Where is the angel? Is he all right?”

  The other two looked at each other, and Black Lips cocked her head. “Come again?”

  Laia gestured to the front of the carriage. “He was with us before, but there’s a barrier there now. I can’t see if he’s okay.”

  Black Lips looked at her for a few moments, then laughed, deep and loud. “Oh, honey. He’s no angel. He’s a fucking asshole.”

  “He’s just following orders, Sadie.” Haraway frowned. The other one is called Sadie. “My orders.”

  “Yeah? So, who’s the asshole then?”

  Haraway kept her frown on, staying silent for a few more moments before turning to Laia with a smile. “Hello. I’m Jenni Haraway. This is Sadie Freeman. What’s your name?”

  “Laia.”

  “Pleased to meet you, Laia. How are you feeling?”

  “I’m…” Laia thought about it, wanting to give the truth to these people in the land of angels. “I miss my brother. Will he be all right?”

  “Which one was your brother?” asked Haraway.

  Not the slaver. Not the devil. Not the one who cages your gift. Laia touched the metal at her neck. “The other one with a collar.”

  “Right,” said Haraway. “He’s probably okay.”

  Sadie snorted but didn’t say anything. Haraway glanced at Sadie before continuing. “He’s with another syndicate.”

  Syndicate. Another word she knew but could give no substance to. Laia scratched her head. “I’m speaking but not … using my words, am I?”

  One of Haraway’s eyebrows lifted. “You don’t know what a language pack is?”

  “Maybe she’s never wanted to have that shit in her brain,” said Sadie. “Some people would prefer to get next to the metal. More predictable than a virus in their heads.” She shuddered as if either path led to horrors. Laia was going to ask what she meant, but the carriage stopped. “You company people? You’re all the same.”

  The side of the carriage opened. Through the door, Laia saw a dead city huddling in the rain. Sadie said, “You motherfucker.” Then, as she saw the ruin outside, “Sweet Jesus.”

  She couldn’t see what Laia saw, though. The rain was alive with the demo
n. The angel stood in the downpour. Laia could see his face for the first time. He had a hard jaw and blue eyes. Perfect. Beautiful. Terrible.

  She could see the demon was already inside him.

  Laia looked at the fire, thinking. Mason Floyd. The angel had a name.

  She took another bite of the food stick she’d been handed. It was delicious, full of substance and strength. It smelled of nuts and something called chocolate. Chocolate had been in the drink she’d had earlier. This place must be Heaven to have chocolate.

  Yet, around her was a dead town. She could see it would have been fine before it fell. Built to a quality her own world couldn’t touch. They’d left it, and all the people, to die.

  Which meant it wasn’t a Heaven Laia could understand. The angel Mason had served them. Laia was prepared to forage for food before he’d handed out food sticks before walking out into the burning rain.

  He didn’t flinch, tall and strong as he’d walked into the demon’s caress.

  Haraway chewed her own food stick. “What did you mean when you said that he had a demon in him, Laia?”

  Sadie spoke while chewing. “I figured it for some kind of hentai reference.”

  Hentai. Another word of meaning and no substance. “What is hentai?”

  Sadie swallowed. “Nothing for you, that’s for sure.” She stood, walking to the edge of the room, looking out through the gap of crumbled wall. The set of her shoulders said: I’m angry. Sadie looked into the rain after Mason, and she was angry. How can you be angry at an angel?

  Haraway scooted forward. “Does the demon have something to do with the rain?”

  Laia stared at Haraway for a few moments. Has she been touched by the sun? Her thoughts have no strength. “The demon is the rain. Every child knows that.”

  Haraway smiled. “Pretend I haven’t been born yet.”

  Laia sighed. “The Masters bring storms. When crops are needed, the rain comes, and the guilty are punished.”

  “How?” asked Haraway. “How are the guilty punished?”

  “The rain.” Laia swallowed, thinking. She pointed past Sadie. “The demon is in the rain.”

  Haraway ran a hand through perfect hair, sighing. “Okay. That’s what I’d call circular logic.”