Project Recollection

by A A Woods

  What’s gotten into me?

  I remember watching the parade of girls that Zhu would bring home as a teenager. They ranged from the waifish to the curvy, the loud to the taciturn, but all of them shared a glassy-eyed adoration of my charismatic brother. Even loud-mouthed, tough-talking Gemma softened around him like butter left on the counter. As a child, I found them ridiculous. How could they be so silly as to moon over my brother? How could my brother be foolish enough to waste time on trivial things like dating and girls and love?

  Of course, when my IRIS cable stole my sight, all that stopped. Gemma stopped coming over and Zhu dedicated himself to the update that would let me see (in a manner of speaking), his spare hours spent endlessly tweaking and smoothing the code of my cable. At the time, I thought he’d matured out of such distractions.

  But now, I realize the sacrifice he made.

  I feel a deep, welling sense of shame that I can’t—or won’t—return the favor.

  I run over the encounter with Khali in my head again, wishing I could tell myself there was no time to ask for her help. That the opportunity never presented itself.

  But that’s a lie.

  The opportunity is painted all over the scene, embedded in every intimate moment. There were a thousand chances, a thousand times I could have asked for a favor. For her help. For a simple, single Obaki duel. It was the best possible time delivered in the best possible way and I blew it, just because I couldn’t bear the thought of her pulling back and leaving me alone again, adrift in the dark.

  The selfish monstrosity of my loneliness threatens to swallow me whole.

  I stop in the middle of the flowing crowd and let the commuters move around me, my father’s PAP pointed uselessly at the ground, my face staring ahead with unseeing eyes.

  A week ago, I was a Gamer trying to get a key. A teammate helping her champion get into the ProRec tournament. A sister trying to find her brother. I had a straightforward objective, a single-minded focus.

  And now?

  Now I’m a girl who’s abandoned her brother and forgotten her Gaming partner, who would rather lose herself in a stranger’s arms than fight. Something horrible happened to Damien and who knows what might be happening to Zhu, but all I can think about is Khali’s fingers curled around my neck, pulling me closer.

  I shake myself.

  I’ll have another chance.

  And, with the ProRec tournament opening tomorrow, this time I’ll need to take it.

  Shoving aside my shame and doubt, I lift the PAP, looking for the signs that will lead me home.

  A familiar face stands out in the crowd. Square head, buzzed hair, steely blue eyes fixed on the back of my head.

  It’s the ProRec employee who followed me last time.

  Raw anger, unhindered by my usual walls, rolls through me, sharpening the vulnerable edges of my temper. Here is the reminder of everything I escaped in Khali’s arms, everything I can’t escape, staring at me with his Fuzz Specs and his muscled arms and his focused expression, waiting for me to move. Waiting to follow the blind girl who supposedly can’t see him and drag her into ProRec’s waiting arms.

  Never let them find you.

  I sway for a moment, frozen in place.

  Then I set off running.

  I move like a cannonball, imprecise and violent, crashing through knots of pedestrians who scream insults in my wake. Trash and detritus grab at my feet but I’m moving too fast to fall, my momentum carrying me forward. Shouts rise like mushroom clouds, but by the time I hear them they’re already behind me, filling the negative space left by my trajectory. I’m sprinting through the tunnel, barreling up stairs, throwing myself over piles of shadowy things I don’t have time to identify.

  Heavy footsteps close the empty space behind me.

  “Stop right there!”

  The male voice grates at something deep in my chest, something so used to being powerless that it can’t help but rise in response. My nails dig into my palms, into the PAP as I swing it dizzyingly in front of me. Things materialize and I react without thinking. Leap. Dodge. Smash through. My hip checks a vendor selling holographic globes and I hear a cascade of fragile things. Glass shatters. A woman shrieks.

  I don’t stop.

  A flight of stairs appears in front of me, sloping down to the parks in front of the super-scrapers.

  I leap onto the railing and slide, my heart hammering. I feel alive, reckless, wild.

  I feel like Khali.

  My feet hit the ground at the bottom of the stairs and I’m stumbling, running again, this time in the open. The stranger’s steps are louder, the crowd looser. I feel vulnerable and shaky, like I’m losing steam. My pulse is painful now, my breathing ragged.

  “Stop her!”

  I swing the PAP up and I see where I am. If I had any breath left I would gasp. I’m in the glittering, ethereal ProRec square, the super-scraper stretching above me like the silvery road to heaven. From below, it almost seems to touch the sky. It’s the beautiful wrapping around something ugly, the paint over a rotting, crumbling wall.

  I snarl and lunge forward. I’ve spent enough time spying on ProRec to know this square like I know my room. And while there’s no chink in the security of the building, there is a tiny, fragile weakness in Project Recollection’s glimmering plaza that I stumbled upon by accident while tuning into Sam Baker’s conspiracy channel: a crack in the ground beside a spun-sugar bench, beneath a polished trash can. It’s a tiny opening into the city below, leftover from the days of vaulted growth, left untended by the engineers who only thought of up.

  The man’s huge feet are slapping the ground behind me. His voice swirls and plunges. But my PAP is trained on the trash can, a decorated thing, inlaid and carved and dreamlike. Just like the tower in front of it.

  “Stop right there! You’re under arrest! I order you to stop!”

  But I don’t. I slide into the trash can like a batter into home. Pain radiates up my leg, but the metal bin tumbles over, spilling debris over the pristine square like sliced intestines. I hear a shriek, the thump of someone falling, the scramble of shoes on pavement, but I’m already rolling through the opening, dropping into the void beneath the city, my thighs catching painfully on jagged cement and rebar. I hang from the edge by my fingertips. Something heavy lands next to me, panting, slapping the ground beside my hands.

  I let go.

  A scream rips out of my lungs as I fall, as open air whips around me. I grab for the PAP, but before I can make sense of the smudged darkness, my body crashes into something solid. Rolls off it. I scrabble, frantically trying to grab hold of something, anything, as I slide over shingles. Broken metal snags my shirt like claws. Something tears. I spin Zhu’s jacket away from nails and rubble. My hand curls around something and my arm pulls tight and my feet are dangling over nothing, but at last my body stops moving.

  I gulp air.

  The man’s voice echoes down at me, bleeding into my panic.

  “Call it in! I need reinforcements!”

  I can’t stop, can’t let them catch me. Judging by the noises above, ProRec is no longer bothering to keep their chase a secret. Have they grown desperate trying to find whatever they couldn’t in my parents’ minds, whatever Zhu hid in mine? Has something changed that would drive them to hunt me down in broad daylight?

  I need to act fast. By now, I’ve been recorded a thousand times. My body will be on the news, my hair swinging in a hundred shared memories. Miraculously, my Fuzz Specs have stayed on. My face, at least, will be blurred.

  With any luck, that will grant me enough time to get home and figure out what to do next.

  Limbs aching, mind reeling, I roll over and find my feet, forcing myself to stumble into the Tunnels and away from the crack in the sky, already teeming with chaos.

  Tora

  Friday, September 21st, 2195

  7:08 P.M. EST

  “Not now, Pixel.”

  I stride through the mess with purpose, brushing p
ast Mom’s wafting, questioning voice, ignoring the new smells and towers of trash.

  I don’t have time for any of it.

  “Mei? Honey?” Mom whispers. “Peaches?”

  My fists clench at the use of Zhu’s code-word.

  “Not now,” I say again as I step into my room, close the door behind me.

  My heart pounds and I force myself to stand still, take a breath. I have no idea how close ProRec is to finding me, but I can’t let fear become a distraction. I have to check my net, figure out what I can do until I’m forced out of my home.

  I plug in before my legs even touch my seat, yanking up my search algorithm with frenzied urgency, questions pounding in harmony with my pulse.

  What is ProRec up to? What happened to Damien? What does it have to do with Zhu?

  I sift through the memories, tossing aside the familiar, the useless. It’s like looking for gold in a dumpster and my patience is running thin. Every sound, every meow, every word my mother calls through the door makes me jerk with fear. The ProRec private police could be stomping through my building, on their way to our door, ready to drag me into one of their interrogation rooms and steal the clues Zhu left for me. Take away any chance I have of finding him.

  Destroy everything I have left.

  Never let them find you.

  I want to scream in frustration, but my breath comes out sharp as I pick out a file. It’s not a memory as much as an errant bit of code, a memo between ProRec departments. From catering to the financial offices.

  Order request for sixty-five bottles of champagne for the event Saturday night.

  I stare at the words, my frantic brain churning.

  Saturday night. Tomorrow. The night of the tournament.

  Sixty-five bottles.

  Something tells me ProRec isn’t giving each Gamer a bottle of champagne…

  I lunge to Damien’s net, desperate, pleading.

  There’s a new memory, a single, scattered recollection uploaded to a middle-schooler’s personal channel about two hours ago. I dive in.

  I’m short, peering between the wrought-iron bars of a fence at that same ornate, gilded mansion. Squat and square and oozing cultivated luxury in the afternoon light.

  William Barber’s home.

  A youthful, high-pitched voice comes from my right. “I swear I saw him last night.”

  My eyes narrow. My face presses against the cold bars. A small bike hangs loosely from my fingertips.

  Something shifts in a high window.

  “There!” My own voice breaks with excitement. I point to the window, to the elongated shape of a body peering out at the world.

  Damien.

  Only again, it isn’t Damien. It’s like looking at his distorted reflection. He’s still tall, thin, blonde, tattooed. But his face is serious rather than arrogant. As he glares out, both eyebrows come together, both sides of his mouth pinch in thought.

  His face is no longer paralyzed.

  What the…? I think as the memory shifts, the children jittery with excitement.

  “Look, that’s him! That’s the new Mr. Barber!”

  I topple out of the recollection. All around me, the code of the SubNet moves and shifts and dances like the northern lights, but I stand stock-still, locked in place.

  What does it mean?

  William Barber, inventor of neural wiring. The richest self-made man in the world. Notorious hermit and bachelor and investor in Project Recollection’s most famous programs.

  What does he have to do with Damien?

  The puzzle pieces float in front of me, stubbornly refusing to fit together.

  An obscure nobody inheriting Barber’s fortune, disappearing into his mansion. Damien vanishing and re-appearing two days later as a billionaire with no neural damage. A secretive tournament luring Gamers into ProRec’s basement with the vague promise of fame, appealing only to those with no one to turn to, no one waiting for them to come home.

  An expensive party thrown on the same night.

  Numbly, on a strange whim I don’t really understand, I throw out an international search, filtering for the insanely wealthy and strange bits of news.

  The results begin to come in, written in various languages. I run a translator over them with one hand, reading without comprehension.

  Chinese real estate mogul leaves everything to unknown youth after impromptu trip to Nova.

  Russian diplomat disappears after Nova conference. Authorities find message exonerating top tech company, Project Recollection.

  No one’s seen supermodel Gertrude Marquis after her visit to ProRec. Does this have something to do with her Multiple Sclerosis? Join in the memory-thread discussion now!

  And there, a tiny news story hidden under piles of huge broadcasts, linked only by the picture on the front, a player I recognize from Kitzima’s ring. I pull it up, read the headline.

  Recent upswing in missing person reports causes widespread concern. Worried mother calls for an investigation of daughter’s disappearance, claiming police inaction anti-Gamer bias.

  I extract myself from the pile of stories, feeling hollow as I set them aside.

  MemHeads and Gamers have always gone missing, wandered off like cats ready to die. The damage caused by the constant overuse of their brains makes them unstable. I knew that. Know that. Accepted it long ago and continue to wrestle with the implication as I watch my mother slide into madness.

  But this is different.

  This is sinister.

  There is a thread connecting these stories. I can’t see it yet, but it radiates with a single, pulsing, angry message.

  Project Recollection is up to something. Something dangerous and furtive. Something to do with their richest investors and lowest customers.

  I don’t know what connects all these things, but something is certain: this can’t mean anything good for the Gamers going into that tournament.

  I sit back in my chair, turning the pieces over, looking at them from every angle. It all comes down to breaking into ProRec’s headquarters. I need to know what’s hiding in my head, how it fits into whatever they did with Damien and all those rich strangers. What they plan to do on Saturday.

  Somehow, it’s all tied to Zhu and the core code I can’t touch.

  Never let them see what I did.

  Frustration rises like magma in my chest. I can’t wait. I need to speak to Khali now, coerce her to help me. Beg for it if I have to. Because it’s not just about finding my brother, not anymore. It’s about Damien and Eva and all the Gamers who will go through ProRec’s doors tomorrow night without knowing if they’ll come back out.

  I need to be among them.

  “Mei!”

  My mother’s voice breaks through, but I’m already moving. Unplugging myself and grabbing Zhu’s ripped jacket and opening my door. I feel Mom’s presence before I plug into the borrowed PAP, before I see her swaying in front of me.

  “I need to go,” I say, stuffing my arms into the jacket sleeves. “Don’t let anyone in. Don’t tell anyone I’m gone. Just stay here, okay Mom? Stay here and be safe.”

  “Mei, what’s going on?”

  I step around her, headed for the door. “I don’t know. But I plan to find out.”

  Memory File of Curtis Wattle

  Chief of Private P.R. Police

  Time Stamp: Friday, September 21st, 2195

  9:32 P.M. EST

  In front of you, Yasmin Abergel stares out the window, her breath fogging the glass and obscuring the taxis and aerial vehicles that fill the evening air. Behind her, the lights of Nova are assaulting. It could be noon, midnight, or anywhere in between, but your aching back and sore knees speak to a day stretched longer than intended.

  “You’re certain?” she asks.

  “We’ve confirmed contact. With the proper resources, she should lead us right to the target.”

  Yasmin whips around, eyes flashing, one brow raised in warning. “The target?”

  You drop your eyes
to the swirling colors of the carpet. Beautiful and otherworldly, like everything else in the Project Recollection super-scraper. “Sorry, ma’am.”

  Yasmin turns back to face the metropolis, dark skin shining, lit from below by the brightest city in the world. “You’re absolutely sure about this? I don’t need another spectacle for the board to use against me.”

  “This afternoon was a mistake. I promise you, the responsible party has been dealt with.”

  “And the mission you’re proposing? How can you promise it won’t be a similar… mistake?” There’s a dangerous edge to her words, a warning that makes your veins constrict and your face flush. But your voice is steady, deep and gravely as you bow your head.

  “As I said, we’ve confirmed contact. With your authorization, we can finally bring her in.”

  Yasmin reaches out, her long fingers brushing against the glass, leaving a smear on its pristine surface. Her mouth pulls down in thought, as if she’s searching the lights, hunting for a hidden message.

  “I know what they think of me,” Yasmin says. Her voice is a whisper, the words floating through the office as if they’re meant for someone else. “What she thinks of me.”

  You cough and shift your feet. “Ma’am, she’s young.”

  Yasmin snaps her hand back, drops it to her side. She turns to you, the fire back in her eyes and brighter than anything behind her. “Well, there’s no turning back now.” She goes to her desk and taps on the screen that dominates its surface. “You have my permission to take whatever measures necessary. I expect to be kept informed as you execute this mission. I also expect to hear about it only from your own men. No news. No publicity. This stays within company limits.”

  “Yes ma’am.”

  Yasmin’s eyes flash to yours, drive into you with the force of twin axes. Her mouth is a slashed line lifted slightly at the corner, the savage cousin of a smile. When she speaks, you feel the words resonate like the order of a general, the command of a queen.

  “Bring her in.”