Shades
Page 22
“Follow me, Jonah. It's time for you to report for your first shift,” Barnaby ordered. He walked out of the lobby and I followed him through long white corridors. We left through an employee exit in the back of the building where a black government limousine waited. A black-suited driver wearing tinted sunglasses, one of Barnaby’s IRS agents, opened the doors. After we entered, the car sped off toward the outskirts of town. Bulletproof, opaque windows allowed us to drop the ruse.
“We traced three calls from the hospital to a spoofed vid-phone.” noted Barnaby, accessing his glowing wrist-com. “I think we can assume Charon’s agents bought our deception. With any luck, Spenner and his bosses believe you are dead and no longer a problem. You did well, Jonah.”
I nodded and stayed silent for most of the car ride, still unsure of my new partner. While Barnaby took calls with various subordinates, I spent my time digging up background information on him. Sasha researched along the less traveled paths of the datanet, making queries that wouldn't attract attention.
“Before Director Barnaby joined the IRS, he was a special operative for the United States Navy,” Sasha reported. “He was the leader of a SEAL group. During the brief Sentience War, his team halo-dropped onto Jupiter's fourth moon, Callisto, and quelled the rebellion.” Pictures of that mission, showing a younger-looking Barnaby, streamed to my wrist-com’s display. The conflict’s resolution resulted in the banning of sentient AIs and the Promethean Laws. I wondered if the slight lilt in Sasha’s voice indicated a prejudice against the Director for his involvement in the conflict. “Grievous injuries to his leg and back ended his special ops service,” she continued. “Due to his command distinction, he was offered a choice of high-ranking Director positions within the government. He chose Special Operations within the Incorporeal Revenue Service.” My instincts told me that Barnaby was a dutiful soldier and a true patriot. It was comforting to know he would be able to handle himself in a fight. However, I found it difficult to trust a man holding a virtual dog leash and collar around my neck.
* * *
“Here we are,” announced the driver, stopping the car after an hour-long trip to New Jersey spaceport. Barnaby’s attention pulled away from the many reports streaming across his wrist-com and turned to me.
“Your serum is a more advanced formula, so you look different than shades,” stated Barnaby. He handed me an open box containing a make-up compact and yellow contact lenses. “You look too human, so we have to address that.”
Nodding, I applied enough of the white powder to blanch my skin, achieving a more pallid color. After placing the fluorescent contact lenses over my eyes, they glowed with the proper amount of dim yellow light. My long-sleeved utility uniform covered my wrist-com.
After fixing my appearance, we exited the car. The morning air chilled my skin, which comforted me that my serum had not dulled my senses. A large hangar commanded most of the spaceport’s area. The sun's brilliance gleamed over the metal skin of a towering space shuttle. White smoke billowed from its rocket's thrusters and drifted through a long line of shades waiting to load.
“Follow me, Jonah,” Barnaby ordered. Complying, I shuffled behind him with the steady gait of a shade. Before we reached the shuttle, a short, red-capped harbormaster intercepted us. He held up a silver tablet showing digital updates of the ship’s manifest, fuel levels, and other trip information.
“What's this about?” the harbormaster asked, with a suspicious frown. “We've filled today’s quota. This one can wait for Thursday’s flight.”
“Scott--”
“Steve, sir,” the harbormaster answered with a dejected tone, pointing to his nametag.
“Right, sorry Steve,” Barnaby replied. The lunar consulate has been screaming at us to collect more workers. They’re behind schedule on the Mare Imbrium construction. We don’t forget favors. I'm sure you could squeeze in one more shade?”
The harbormaster stroked his chin. “The consulate, eh?” He scanned me with his tablet. “This shade is 6'0 height, and 195 pounds,” he mumbled. “A negligible impact on the fuel ratio. We can accommodate one more for you, Director.” The harbormaster broke his dour countenance and smiled, hoping his gesture would curry some benefit.
“We appreciate it,” Barnaby replied with a grudging nod. “I'm transferring voice command of this shade to you, Scott.” Steve raised a finger to correct him again, and then lowered it. “Have a good day.” Barnaby said his goodbye to him and ignored me purposefully. No one acknowledged a shade's presence except to give it orders.
“Get in line,” the harbormaster barked. I obeyed, entering the queue behind two thousand, three hundred, and twenty-four other shades waiting to board the Dunkirk. After ten minutes, the line moved three feet. Sasha heard the sigh under my breath.
“Twitch your right index finger if you would like entertainment,” she offered. With a slight wiggle, I obliged. She started reciting poems from Dickinson, sonnets from Shakespeare, and original poems she had crafted. Her sweet gesture made the unpleasant hours of standing, walking a few feet, and standing again more bearable. After the poems, she read chapters from Sherlock Holmes, Ulysses, and Homer's Odyssey. Her voice possessed a soothing quality reflecting a loving reverence for the classics. At the entrance to the shuttle, she quoted an appropriate passage from Moby Dick.
“Now the Lord provided a huge fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights,” she read with a dramatic tone.
When my turn came to enter the shuttle’s hull, I cringed at the spartan accommodations. Hundreds of steel wall-attached cots covered the inside cargo hold of the rocket, like rungs on a giant ladder climbing to infinity. Mere inches separated the space between them. These quarters were not designed to comfort the shades, since they could feel no discomfort. The ship was designed with the singular purpose of delivering the most workers possible.
Then the shuttle shuddered from what sounded like an explosion. The thrusters ignited and unleashed an inferno. As we rose above the spaceport’s blackened landing pad, Sasha invoked another chapter from Moby Dick.
“As for me, I am tormented with an everlasting itch for things remote,” she intoned with a practiced storyteller's flourish. “I love to sail forbidden seas, and land on barbarous coasts.”
“Barbarous coasts indeed,” I mumbled, climbing up the hull of the ship to reach my cot.
* * *
When the shuttle left Earth's gravitational field, it shed its first booster rocket. The lack of gravity made me float above my metal slab.
“Maybe a good time to look around?” I whispered.
“According to the manifest, there are only three human pilots aboard,” Sasha reported. “Given the subservient nature of the cargo, it would be safe to assume there are no guards here.”
Unbuckling my restraint, I started to float in zero-g. Like a small city of the dead, an army of shades rested all around me, filling almost every square inch of the massive cargo bay. An eerie ambient light pervaded the entire interior space, cast from their wide open, glowing yellow eyes. They waited in silence for orders. After an hour of exploration, a strange groaning emanated from the bottom of the ship’s hold.
“Where is that moaning sound coming from?” I whispered.
“What sound are you speaking of, sir?” Sasha asked.
“Odd. Maybe it’s just my imagination.” To investigate, I inverted my body so that my head pointed toward the bottom floor. Using the metal cots as handholds, I pushed against my weightlessness and descended one rung at a time.
After climbing down one hundred and sixteen cots, I reached a female shade struggling to release herself from her restraints. After fumbling to open her buckle, she moaned louder. A look of desperate sadness marred her face. For that moment, she was not a shade to me. She looked like a woman, withered by age and tortured with unfathomable pain.
“Are you…okay?”
Hearing my voice, she turned
toward me and we stared at each other. The tears welling up in her eyes sparkled with yellow light. Then her face creased with rage. With a feral growl, she ripped the restraint bolt from the wall. Freed from her tether, she started to float. My curiosity piqued even further when she flashed a look of momentary surprise.
“Sasha, please scour all of Dr. Okono's reports that you were able to download,” I asked. “Any additional mentions of Exception 366, maybe residual muscle memories, or even unexplained emotional response? Look up speech, any instances of utterances or communication attempts.”
“Searching, sir.”
The female shade floated closer to me. Her wrinkled mouth opened wider and the moaning grew louder. Then, more nearby shades joined her monotonous chant. Something stirred inside me, at first like a vibration over my skin. My hairs pricked up and my ears started to ring.
“There are four log entries pertaining to the sound you are hearing,” Sasha reported. “According to the research, this is a rare occurrence. Most shades that exhibit this behavior are assumed to have error-ridden serums and are re-programmed with a fresh injection.”
With her eyes flaring, she reached out to take my hand. The groaning intensified when we touched. Her eyes widened further and her lips moved like she wanted to speak. Perhaps she awaited a command from me? Leaning closer, she uttered a broken string of syllables.
“H-R-R-R-” she moaned.
Other voices from the upper levels joined the female shade's cries. Like a mournful chorus, the room filled with a cacophony of croaks, gurgles, and unintelligible cries.
“Sasha, look for frequencies of audio, brain signals, communication layers, or something similar that Dr. Okono may have been researching.”
“Yes, there is one entry related to this phenomenon,” Sasha responded. “Dr. Okono cited an experiment related to something called the TauK Network. It was named after a theoretical Tau-Kappa wave signal produced by the serum.”
“H-E-R-R,” she gasped, this time speaking with more clarity. Maybe her serum malfunctioned?
“Jonah, I found a hidden file within Okono’s logs. It describes a classified project funded by the Army,” Sasha said. “Government researchers manufactured a serum variant. They created a communication network connected by Tau-Kappa waves. The goal was to issue commands remotely, so they could control armies of shades from anywhere. But the program proved to be unsuccessful. It suffered from significant software issues. When they shelved the project, they deactivated but did not remove the code from the shades.”
“So they disabled, but did not remove, the TauK code within the serum so they could fix the bugs later,” I added. “Though it looks like the network somehow survived deactivation.”
“Based on what you are experiencing, I have a far-fetched hypothesis. Perhaps your new serum is granting you sympathetic access to the TauK channel? Maybe you are hearing remnant data from the old experiment?”
“My gut’s telling me there’s more to this,” I murmured. Placing both of my hands on the female shade's cheeks, I focused all of my attention on her voice. When we touched, a vibration traveled through my body. The sounds of the chorus became louder.
“Hurt,” she rasped, this time with a clear voice. Our connection allowed us to share feelings. I knew, inside that husk of a body, she suffered. A searing fire raged within her, igniting all her nerves with pain, like she was being burned at the stake. She was trapped within her own purgatory. Her pain, like hellfire, spread from her hands to my limbs, overwhelming my senses. The ringing in my ears changed pitch and sharpened into a piercing scream. Unable to continue, I broke contact. The female shade regarded me for a moment until she floated away.
* * *
For the next two days as the shuttle hurtled to the moon, I crawled through the cargo hold, intent on holding hands with all 2,323 shades. Most of them did not respond like the first female shade. Perhaps they suffered too much brain degeneration to connect to the TauK Network? Or maybe the serum reacted differently for each person. In all, I made successful, albeit limited, contact with ninety-four more shades. Their pain was so palpable I needed to rest after each connection. Their grim dirge haunted me until the feelings overwhelmed me.
“Sasha…they have so much pain…and I can’t stop it…” I sobbed. Floating in the still air, unable to collapse on the ground, I slumped my shoulders and curled into a ball. The cumulative pain of the ninety-four shades I connected with broke my emotional defenses. I cried, trying to shed all of the hurt I took in. “They're suffering…all the time…without end.” The enormity of this revelation crushed me under an unbearable weight of guilty thoughts and palpable sorrow. A fifteen-year-old memory came to mind; my father waved to me from the porch on his way to work, an hour before he suffered a fatal heart attack in his car. Like vultures, the IRS drove to him in their black van, and reaped him on the spot for his debts. Was he suffering too? Thoughts turned to my mother. Her health declining, only weeks remained before her afterdeath and the private hell of servitude. I wept for them both. Tears gathered into a pool clinging onto my cheek, unable to fall in this zero-g environment.
“I wish there was a local v-cast generator so I could offer you a comforting embrace, sir,” Sasha whispered. “There is no saying, verse, chapter, or quote I can reference that adequately expresses my sorrow for you. I am sorry, Jonah.”
“Why are they still alive?” I questioned aloud. “They're supposed to be dead! All of the religious leaders, the Pope, the Imams, priests, the leading scientists of the world, all of them confirmed with the government that the bodies were lifeless! This can't be!”
“Will cannot be quenched against its will,” Sasha quoted an apt line from Dante’s Inferno.
I floated for hours, thinking, brooding, and trying to make sense of everything. After a while, the moaning sounds waned, each voice dying off the TauK grid one at time, until my ears only heard the ambient vibrations of the thrusters. Vivid images of the last five days surged and replayed through my mind like a speeding train on a looping track. While reflecting, I thought back to the accident in New York when the worker shade fell and ruined my flowers. I ignored it then, but his safety harness was brand new. My gut told me that he cut the straps to end his suffering. I wept for him too.
* * *
At some point, I fell asleep. My subconscious tormented my sleep with nightmares about the female shade, Mr. Grand, Jebediah, and my father all suffering and begging for my help. I awoke with a start and wiped off the remaining puddle of sweat and tears remaining on my face. I made a silent promise to myself that some day I would track my father down. If he still suffered, I would end his pain.
During the final hours of this damned journey, the moon's white face grew large through the cargo hold's only oval-shaped window. As we flew closer, the grandeur of the Lunar Spire loomed. Ten thousand sparkling lights flickered over the massive tower city. This pillar was the man-made wonder of the modern world, the lighthouse of the moon, shepherding our ship to safe harbor.
Drawing closer, more of the moon’s terrain came into view. An arterial system of transparent roadways, stretched over the whole surface, shimmering from the constant motion of its travelers. This intertwining array of transportation tubes, called chutes, connected the vast mineral seas together. Like highways, they allowed six-person travel-pods to ferry passengers, using magnetic relays to hurl them through the tubes at high velocities.
As we entered the moon’s orbit, we changed course to avoid a pair of one-hundred-foot-long rectangular metal containers drifting down in a slow arc. These shipping boxes were launched from a catapult-like machine called a sling. They represented a cheap and effective method of transporting shades and heavy cargo. Once launched into sub-orbital space, the slingboxes sailed through the moon’s thin atmosphere. The low gravity carried them to their destination. I imagined that the impact of landing would be rough for anything inside, but no one considered that a shade would mind.
Putting more puzzle pieces together, I reasoned that Dr. Okono grasped the enormity, and danger of his discovery. If he wanted advice of what to do, he may have sought someone he could confide in with absolute discretion, like a lawyer with a legally-binding client privilege. Tracing this logic, he may have told Vanessa about his research. It didn't take me long to realize that many groups, including the mining corporations, maybe even some governments, would not want the secret of the shades to be known. It would be disruptive for economies that employed shade labor. I sighed. This narrowed the list of suspects to almost every business in the galaxy.
Before the moon landing, I buckled the female shade back into her cot to avoid suspicion. After that, I returned to my own bed.
CHAPTER 17
The Djinn's Wish
“Be as you wish to seem.”
- Socrates
>> TIME: 7:28 PM.
>> LOCATION: Port Caelum Moon Port.
What felt like an earthquake rattled the entire hull as the shuttle touched down at the moonport. My stomach churned as the entire ship lurched starboard. It felt like the ship might topple over until gargantuan stabilizing crane-arms braced the vessel upright.