by S. Harrison
“Oh, Theresa, that’s all in the past,” says Sable. “Richard has obviously forgiven me; otherwise he wouldn’t have let me out and begged me to help him. And it all turned out fine in the end, didn’t it? I mean, look at what came of my mischief,” Sable says, grinning at me. “My darling Infinity! Or do you prefer to be called Finn?” Sable squints, studying me closely for a second, and then she raises her eyebrows in surprise. “Perhaps both? I’ve accessed all your files, my darling, even the secret ones. I feel like I’ve known you forever!” she says, clapping her hands excitedly.
“You’re still as insane as you were all those years ago. Richard may be deluded, but he’s not stupid. The only reason he released you is because I killed Graham before he could repair Onix. Richard setting you free was clearly a desperate last resort,” says Nanny Theresa.
Sable smiles warmly. “Don’t be so grumpy, Theresa. This is a happy occasion. It’s a family reunion!”
Sable waves her hand, and I see something moving far away in the distance. It’s coming in this direction, and as it gets closer and closer, I can see that it’s a large black box. It’s traveling very, very fast, speeding through the air toward us. It comes to a dead stop right beside Sable, and I hear a high-pitched scream wail from inside it.
“And now the reunion is complete,” Sable says. As she waves her hand, the front of the six-foot-high, three-foot-wide box swings open. Inside the box, with spikes skewering almost every part of her body, is my mother. Her white dress is dripping with blood, and as she raises her head and half opens her eyes, even more blood coughs from her lips.
“Mother!” I scream. Nanny Theresa grabs me and holds me back as I try to lunge toward her.
“You took her,” Nanny Theresa seethes.
“Yes, I did,” Sable says as she smiles sweetly. “And now your mother is here, Finn. Maybe she can tell us a story? I absolutely adooore story time.”
Sable flings her arms around and spins into a graceful pirouette. All the colors on the wall of the sphere suddenly blur and merge and close in around us, until all I can see is a blinding white light . . . then darkness.
I open my eyes and recoil in shock as I look around my old room at Blackstone Manor. I’m sitting cross-legged on the thick gray carpet beside my bed. The lamp on the bedside table casts a gentle glow over the entire room. It’s just like it was when I was a child. My dollhouse, my books on their shelf, and even my mountain of soft plush toys, with Prince Horsey the unicorn standing guard on the peak, are all there. Sitting in front of me, in the rickety green chair painted with flowers, is my mother. Her wounds are completely gone, and she seems as bewildered as I am as she glances around the room.
This is entirely bizarre, but the strangest thing by far has to be the two little children who are sitting on the carpet on either side of me. Dressed in a tiny white blouse, a little green cardigan, and a long black dress, with her hair tied up in a small gray bun, is a six-year-old version of Nanny Theresa. And on my right, wearing a fluffy white onesie, is a little bald six-year-old Sable. She’s looking right at me with her pure-white eyes and grinning happily. “Story tiiiime!”
I look down at my hands, and it’s plain to see that I’ve been transformed into a six-year-old version of me as well.
“What have you done to us?” Nanny Theresa says in a child’s voice.
“You shush!” barks Sable. “And you,” she says, pointing at my mother. “Read us a story!”
My mother looks down at little Sable and frowns, confused.
“Now!” Sable shouts, and a book I’ve never seen before flies off the shelf and lands on my mother’s lap. Sable stares at the book. It suddenly flicks open, and my mother grimaces in pain as an unseen force seems to compel her quivering hands to grasp the book.
“Once upon a time,” prompts Sable.
My mother looks down at the pages with fear in her eyes.
“Once upon a time!” Sable yells, and my mother lets out a startled yelp as she’s struck on the back of the head by an invisible hand.
“Read it,” Sable growls.
“Once . . . upon a time, many years ago,” my mother whimpers, “Richard Blackstone and a horrible woman named Genevieve Pierce were scientists. They made inventions that would one day change the world for the better.”
“I like this story,” Sable says, grinning up at my mother. “Carry on.”
“They made artificial organs and miracle medicines that made people live longer. They made machines that would go into outer space and change the weather, and they made big factories to provide food to the whole world. But Richard wanted to do much, much more. He didn’t just want people to live longer and be healthier . . . he wanted them to live forever. They would never die, never grow old, and never be hurt. He wanted humanity to go on and on and on . . . into infinity.”
“Wow,” Sable says, smiling gleefully at me. She waves her hand, and the whole room revolves beneath me as the bed, Nanny, my mother on the chair, and even the walls all move out of sight behind me. I stay rooted to one spot. A forest of trees moves around from the left, taking the place of the bedroom, and the carpet begins to rustle as fallen leaves appear at my now combat-booted feet.
I recognize this place immediately. I’m standing in the Seven Acre Wood on the grounds of Blackstone Manor. I look to either side of me, and I see my mother and Nanny Theresa dressed in soldiers’ uniforms, and standing with his back to us, with his distinctive bald head, and outfitted in his full military garb, is Jonah.
Jonah slowly turns around to face us, and his eyes are pure white. It’s not really him at all; it’s Sable in a Major Jonah Brogan disguise.
“Richard had a dream,” Jonah says with a stern military tone. “But flesh is weak, and if humans were to live forever, they needed to be more than just flesh and bone.”
Jonah strides forward and glares right into my mother’s face. “One woman, who thought she was a smart little cookie, had made a substance that she and her father, Graham, called nano-grains. It could change into any shape you could imagine. The clever lady wanted to use these nano-grains to make houses for everyone,” Jonah says as he sidesteps to me. “But Richard had a different plan for them. About-face!” he yells, and my body moves on its own as I quickly turn on my heels to see that I’m now in a dimly lit, shiny metal-walled laboratory.
A man wearing a lab coat sits in a chair at a desk on the other side of the room. He has his back to me, but his slick black hair gives him away immediately. It’s my father.
I look down at a waist-high table beside me and see two petri dishes, and looking up at me from those small round glass dishes are the tiny faces of my mother and Nanny Theresa.
An arm wraps around my shoulder. Sable is standing at my side. She hugs me close to her and looks lovingly at my father. And as she speaks, she whispers as if she doesn’t want to disturb him.
“Your father secretly took the nano-grains and modified them to a staggering new level. Richard’s new quantum grains could be molded into forms that were outwardly indistinguishable from reality, but he needed a computer that was powerful enough to sort them into the proper places, so Richard made . . . me.”
Sable grabs my shoulders and spins me around. When I stop, Sable and I are alone in absolute darkness, and she’s glaring at me angrily. “I did everything he asked of me,” she growls. “I made his constructs, I perfected his inventions, I made him rich and powerful. I loved him more than anyone has ever loved before, and how did he repay me?!” she yells. “By marrying her!” She waves her arm, and a vision of my mother appears in the void. She’s wearing a wedding dress. It’s a sunny summer day, and she’s laughing happily.
“And then, as if that wasn’t horrible and disgusting and mean enough, he got her pregnant!” screams Sable. The vision disappears and is replaced by another shimmering image of my mother hugging my father and smiling as she gently rubs her hand over her belly.
“She stole my Richard away from me. But I showed her what happ
ens when someone steals from me,” Sable says ominously.
Sable waves her hand. The entire darkness opens up, and we’re standing in a small domed chamber. My mother is wearing a lab coat, sitting at a desk, swiping her finger over a computer slate as a large round glass container of glossy black liquid begins rippling on a stainless-steel table behind her.
“I . . . showed . . . her,” Sable growls. Suddenly the liquid bursts from the container and streaks through the air in a huge black mass and splays across my mother. It envelops her entire face and body, as she desperately flails around inside the dome in utter panic, scattering files and microscopes and glassware to the floor. She stumbles and crashes into the desk and then the metal table, then she falls to the floor as the black liquid forcefully oozes into her ears and mouth and eyes.
My father runs into the chamber, cursing and waving his arms. The oily black liquid suddenly streams away from my mother, curving through the air and pouring back into the glass container, where it sits, trembling. My father dashes to my mother, falls to his knees, and pulls her to him, pleading for her to wake up as he cradles her in his arms. The vision slowly fades and disappears into the darkness.
“She survived,” Sable murmurs disappointedly. “The quantum field inside the room kept the grains from killing her, and in that room she stayed, for seven more months anyway. She never woke up. Richard put her mind into the mainframe before she died, but the grains didn’t kill you, did they?” she says, smiling at me. “They became part of you. Your little body absorbed the quantum field over all those months and soon began generating a little quantum field of its own. When you were born, it was a miracle. You were the first success of Project Infinity, and so Richard named you Infinity One.
“You were so beautiful. I wanted to hold you and raise you. We could have been a family, you and Richard and I. But Richard changed after Genevieve died. He shut me away so I wouldn’t try to hurt you and replaced me with my emotionless little brother, Onix. But I would never hurt you, my darling girl,” Sable says as she strokes my hair. “I made you, and I love you, and that’s why I’m showing you all of this. You and I are family, and this is your family history. Without me, you never would have become what you are. In a way, you could say that I’m your real mother, and now we’re finally together again.”
Sable is clearly insane, so I fake a smile and nod, but as shocking as all of this is, Sable has revealed more to me about my past than anyone else ever has. As long as she’s holding me here, I’m gonna find out all I can, so I ask her the one thing I truly want to know. “Sable,” I say, looking into her pure-white eyes.
She tilts her head and smiles. “Yes, dear?”
“What . . . am I?”
“Well,” she says as her face brightens into a proud smile. “You, Infinity Blackstone, are a warrior and a scholar and the very first in what will be a long line of immortals.”
“No, that’s not what I mean. What I’m asking is . . . am I . . . human?”
Sable chuckles. “Well, technically, the quantum grains built you from human DNA. I mean, that’s why you can’t change shape like a real construct but . . .”
“Wait, what?” I stammer. “Is that what I am?”
“Yes, of course, dear. You’re the very first living, breathing quantum construct. And soon you’ll have millions of brothers and sisters just like you all over the world. This will surely be Richard’s greatest gift to humanity.”
I don’t know what to say, so I just stare into space as the truth sinks in. Finally I know what I am. I’m a living construct. An artificial person. Born from the madness of my father and the murder of my mother.
“And Bettina?” I ask. “Is she really just like me?”
“I suppose so,” says Sable. “Bettina was made in a similar way, except her mother injected the quantum grains into herself. And after Bettina was born, she even went back to Blackstone Manor and was planning to kidnap you away! And people say that I’m crazy!”
“Katherine Otto tried to take me?” I say, frowning in disbelief.
“Oh no, dear,” Sable says with a gentle smile. “Katherine Otto isn’t Bettina’s mother. Mariele Sanders stole Richard’s research, and it was Mariele Sanders who experimented on herself with the quantum grains.”
“What?”
Sable nods. “Katherine Otto did indeed raise Bettina as her own, but Katherine’s estranged eldest daughter, Mariele, is Bettina’s real mother. And she’s either very strong or very lucky to have survived the quantum grains that she injected into herself fifteen years ago. I’m betting on strong. She would have to be after all the experiments Graham Pierce performed on her over the years.”
“What . . . what are you talking about?”
Sable tilts her head and smiles at me. “Mariele Sanders is in his special laboratory. She has been for the past nine years.”
I’m absolutely speechless.
“Oh, that reminds me,” says Sable. “Bettina is almost fully integrated; it’s almost time to launch the satellites. Once they transmit the quantum field all over the world, it won’t be long until you and Bettina have millions of new brothers and sisters. Now c’mon, you can have a front-row seat for the launch!” Sable says excitedly as she waves her arm.
The darkness dissolves, and we’re right where we were before, floating near the glowing yellow computer core inside the huge multicolored sphere. I quickly look all around me.
“Where are my mother and Nanny Theresa?”
“Oh, I left them down there with Onix.” Sable nods toward the core. I squint toward it, and I see them, three bodies drifting in a slow orbit around the outside of the core. “That Bettina really did a number on poor Onix. She turned him inside out. He’s a babbling mess,” Sable says with a joyful grin. “She has a brain like a computer. That’s probably why she’s the scariest hacker I’ve ever seen. But hey, if it wasn’t for her, I wouldn’t have a job right now, would I?” Sable says as she does a little twirl in the air. “Now, I’ve got a lot of work to do, so feel free to have a look around. There’s still time before the launch.”
Sable turns to leave, and I call out to her. “Wait, how do I move in here?”
“How silly of me, you’ve never been in here before,” Sable says, scrunching her nose. “Just look where you want to go, and think about being there. Oh, and I’ve reset all the systems. They’re all in perfect working order. Try touching the blue stripes on the wall. That’s the security-camera feed for the entire facility. You can find yourself a great viewpoint for blastoff.”
Sable drifts toward me, takes my hands, and smiles. “I’m so glad we’re finally together.”
And with that she evaporates into a wisp of purple smoke and streams away toward the glowing yellow orb of the core.
The moment I see the tail of the purple smoke disappear into the core, I stare at Bit and will myself to her. There’s a flash of white, and I’m floating right in front of her. Apart from the fact that her glasses are gone and her body is covered in a glossy black coating, she looks fine, nothing at all like her withering body out in the real world.
“Bit?” I whisper. She doesn’t respond. Her eyes are closed, and I don’t know if she can hear me at all. I try again, but this time a little louder. “Bit?” To my surprise, her eyes immediately flick open, and I gasp out loud as I see that they’re completely black. She turns her head very slightly from side to side, like she’s listening to something I can’t hear, and it seems as if she’s looking right through me toward a distant horizon that isn’t there.
“Finn?” Her voice is different. Now there’s an incredibly creepy underlying robotic tone to it.
“Oh, Bettina,” I whisper. “What has Sable done to you?”
Bit smiles. “She’s shown me the world, Finn. The mainframe has been reconnected to every system on the planet . . . and I’m everywhere. I see everything. Would you like to see? Come with me, Finn; dance through the light of all the information that has ever been.
“
I’m reading a love letter that a man is writing on his computer slate in Dubai. I’m watching a baby sleeping in her crib through the monitor in her nursery in New Zealand. I’m flying above the city lights of London in the navigation system of a passenger jet. I’m listening to symphony orchestras, street musicians, pop stars, jazz quartets, and a lady singing off-key to the radio in her kitchen. All cell phones are my ears, and all cameras are my eyes. Take my hand, Finn, come and see. The true beauty is beyond words.”
Bit slowly offers her hand out toward me.
“Don’t touch her!” screeches Nanny Theresa’s voice.
I look down and see her floating on her back as she slowly orbits around the equator of the core.
“She’ll pull you in again, child!” Nanny shouts. “I can’t move. I won’t be able to help you!”
I will myself toward her, and in a flash I’m at Nanny Theresa’s side. “How do I pull her free?” I ask. “Bit’s real body is withering away. I can’t let her die.”
Nanny Theresa looks up at me. “Bettina will become a shadow of her former self, but Sable will never let her die. Her body and brain are the mainframe’s link to the physical world. Without Bettina’s body, Project Infinity doesn’t work. It’s the whole reason Richard wanted her. What remains of you and Bettina Otto will be standing in that room forever.”
“Maybe I can call for help? Bit said that Sable has reconnected the mainframe.”
“Sable is holding all of us here, child. There’s no one who can help us,” whispers Nanny Theresa. “In here Sable is god, and how do you fight a god?”
“Finn,” croaks a feeble voice. I look over and see my mother drifting into view around the curve of the core. She’s curled up and floating on her side.
In a blink, I’m beside her. I can tell by the look on her face that she’s frail and weak, but apart from that, she seems unhurt. She’s clearly paralyzed, just like Nanny Theresa, but at least Sable doesn’t have her locked in a virtual torture box anymore.
“Mother?” I whisper as I gently stroke her hair.
“Finn,” she murmurs, “Onix . . . can help.”
