by Lior Samson
He was finally back in his own Tensora N. It had surprised him that it took so long for his car to be returned from servicing. He had enjoyed trialing the NX loaner, but it never felt like his car, and it lacked the customized full-manual mode that he loved. On the NX, he became resigned to letting the car park itself but could not find how to override the auto-turn mode or the street-light algorithms that prevented him from running through on a yellow. The Model N, his Model N, was like a perfect pair of running shoes that slipped on and off without effort and felt right on every stride of a run.
Saturday morning traffic was light. As he made the turn onto Old Topanga Canyon Road, he did a quick out-and-in-again around a slow sedan and tromped on the accelerator. He would see Gwen, maybe for the last time, then double back to pick up his daughter at the camp before the noon deadline. It had taken some fancy footwork to convince Barbra that it would be all right for him to go alone to pick up Becca. “Father-daughter time,” he had told her. “You know how important it is for girls at this age to have a good relationship with a strong father figure. I definitely get the message that she wants to have that ride home to talk, you know. It’s a phase. Next year it’ll probably be all about you, and she won’t even want to go near me.”
Time for some music, he thought, something big, grand, one of the romantics. He was the only one in the family who was into symphonic music, and he had his own custom playlists drawing on a deep repertoire he had assembled himself. Brahms? Maybe the Second Symphony. No. Wagner. Perfect. He switched the audio to the headrest speakers and skipped to the opening of the third act of Die Walküre. In a moment, the Valkyries were with him in soaring triumph on his open-air ride up the canyon.
He slowed as he approached the next switchback, then accelerated smoothly through the turn. He straightened the wheel and the car shot forward, pinning him to the seatback.
Part 2
One has to pay dearly for immortality; one has to die several times while one is still alive.
– Friedrich Nietzsche
— 7 —
For the crew of Canyon Consolidated Emergency Services, it had been the second call and the first false alarm of the day. There had been no heart attack at the mall, and Mike and Speedo were now on their way back to the station.
Speedo hit the brakes hard, sending Mike, his paramedic, sliding in the back. “Holy shit, Mike. Did you see that? That sports car just sailed right off the road.”
“I didn’t see it, but I felt it. What are you trying to do? Kill me? Give me some warning. At least yell ‘Hold on!’ before you pull that again.”
“Yeah, yeah. Hold on, I’m pulling over to check this guy out.”
“Call it in, first. You know what happened last time we took off on our own. Call it in.”
“I will. Can you hop out the back and make your way down the bank. That car just flew off the road. I don’t see how …”
Mike Capitano swung his heavy frame out of the ambulance and looked around. There were no fresh skid marks, but the brush at the end of the guard rail was crushed. From the side of the road he could see a black-and-yellow Tensora roadster lying upside down at the bottom of the gully.
He ducked back in the ambulance and grabbed his bag. “It sure doesn’t look good,” he called out to Speedo. “I’m going down the embankment to check it out. I’ll use the radio to let you know.”
The way down proved to be a lot steeper than it looked at first. Mike half climbed, half slid his way down. The Tensora was on its back, against a boulder and partially supported by its automatic roll bar. Judging from the exterior damage, the car had rolled more than once before coming to rest. Mike flattened himself on the ground to look underneath. The unconscious driver was suspended from his shoulder harness, his head angled against the ground. Mike gingerly felt for a carotid pulse. He tapped the button on his mic. “The driver’s alive. I’ve got a weak pulse,”—he checked his watch—“48. Get a rescue team out here. And check the satnav to see if there’s a way to bring an ambulance around closer on another road. It would be a bitch trying to get the guy up the embankment. I’m going to see if I can right the vehicle.”
“Roger that. I already radioed for backup. There’s a dirt road running just below where you are, maybe ten yards, but the turnoff is miles back. I’m going to have the rescue crew come in that way. Meantime, I’m going to grab some stuff and come down after you.”
“Roger that. Take it careful. I don’t want to be picking up your pieces, too.”
Mike crawled under the car again to check on his patient. There was blood on his face and arms, but no signs of major bleeding. He clipped a wireless monitor on one finger of the man’s dangling arm and glanced down at the remote readout at his own waist. Not good. He had two options for extracting the man. He could cut the seatbelt and try to ease him to the ground, then drag him out from under, or he could roll the car first. It was unclear which was the more risky, but getting the car upright seemed the best option at the moment. He fished a cervical collar out of his bag and fixed it around the man’s neck.
Mike was looking for a good point of leverage when Speedo showed up towing a rescue stretcher loaded with gear. “I walked back a couple hundred yards and found a better way down. I’ve got ropes, hand winch, oxygen, the works. What do you think? How’s our guy doing?”
Mike looked down at his remote reader. “We may be losing him. Pulse is dropping, oh-two is not good. I don’t have a cuff on him, but I’ll lay odds his BP is falling, too. I think he may be going into shock. I already got a collar on him and strapped his arms. So, give me a hand here.”
Had the car been a classic, like a little Miata, it would have been a piece of cake for two men to upright it again, but it was a Tensora. Battery technology had been improving, but all-electric vehicles still carried massive banks of heavy batteries.
The two men gave a trial lift to one side. “No way. And I don’t see any easy way to anchor a winch. We’ll have to drag him free. I’ll come in from this side. You get his legs from the other. I think we can do this fairly gently if we just take it slow and easy.”
By the time they had freed him from the vehicle and finished securing him to the stretcher, the rescue team arrived, led by a beefy middle-aged jock with a paramedic insignia on his jacket. “What have we got?”
“Multiple injuries, unknown, possible internal bleeding. Treating for cardiogenic shock, dopamine IV. Pulse still too low, 51. Oh-two, 82; BP, 85 over 50.”
“Okay, let’s get him into the wagon and out of here, stat.”
— —
Barbra stabbed her index finger at the woman behind the counter. “I’m his wife. Barbra Ann Wilson. I want to see him.”
“I’m afraid that’s impossible. Your husband is still in surgery.”
“Surgery? What in hell happened? He’s going to be all right, isn’t he.”
“You’ll have to speak with the doctor, Mrs. Wilson.”
“Then let me see the doctor.”
“I’m sorry, but he’s in surgery.”
“All right, so when does he get out of surgery?”
“I’m sorry, but I couldn’t say.”
Barbra slapped her hand flat on the counter. “Well, somebody damn well better say something or I’m going to sue this hospital so fast and so bad you’ll all need surgery.”
“Please calm down, Mrs. Wilson. It will just—”
“Don’t fucking tell me to calm down, you …”
“Can I help?” Barbra whirled at the voice behind her and almost collided with a short man in a long white coat. “I’m Dr. Ishakzai. Is there something I can do for you.”
“You bet. You can tell me about my husband and let me see him. And you can fire this worthless pile working your front desk.”
“What’s your husband’s name?”
“Todd Drucker. Well, Coleman Todd Drucker. And they won’t let me see him.”
“Well, let me see what I can do.” He slipped a tablet from a pocket in his
coat and started tapping and swiping. “So, I see he was brought in by ambulance about two hours ago, and he’s still in surgery.”
“Why is he in surgery? What happened? I got a text message from Tensora, from ERIN, their damn road service software, saying the car had been involved in an accident. Then I got the call from the rescue service that he was being brought here.”
“Well, I can’t tell you what happened, but the code from the FirstSight accident report filed automatically by the Tensora service means the vehicle left the road.”
“Is he going to be all right?”
“The med-surg team is doing their best, and they are the best. That’s why I’m doing my residency here.”
“So, you’re not a real doctor, then, not yet.”
“Oh, I’m real enough. I’m just doing a second residency before I head home. Thanks to old immigration policies that never quite got fixed, once I leave, I may not be able to get back in. So, I’m trying to pack in as much learning as I can before I head home.”
“And where is home?”
“Afghanistan. Kabul.”
“And you want to go back?”
“Wouldn’t you want to go back home after seven years abroad?”
“But, Kabul … I mean, it never seems to get settled. First the Taliban, then … oh, you know.”
“I do know, all too well, which is why I want to go back and do what I can to help, especially out in the rural provinces where doctors are scarce and sorely needed.”
“Well, that’s admirable, I suppose, but I just want to know about my husband. Is he all right?”
The doctor swiped left on his tablet. “I can tell you he just got out of surgery. I’d give it, say, a half hour, and then ask nicely at the nurse’s station in the intensive care wing—just follow the signs—ask if you can look in on him. It won’t be much of a visit, but at least you can see him. I’ll send a note to the ICU that you’re here and want to see your husband.”
“Thank you, doctor. I appreciate that.”
“And well you should.” His warm smile lifted his moustache. “Think of all the work I just went through for you, checking my tablet and all. My poor finger is all worn out from swiping this way and that.”
— —
Barbra put her hand over her mouth and whispered. “Oh, my god, Todd.”
He was a mess. His bare arms were scraped and bruised. His head was bandaged, and his face was swollen with bruises where it was not covered by the ventilator mask. An octopus of tubes and cables connected him to an army of blinking and clicking devices.
“Is he awake? Can he hear me.”
The nurse shook her head. “Probably not. He’s still sedated. I’ll let Dr. Baretti fill you in.” She busied herself checking readings.
“Can’t you tell me?”
“Dr. Baretti will be here in just a few minutes.”
“This is what I’m always being told. Somebody else will tell me. Soon. Real soon now.”
“I know it must be frustrating not knowing.”
“And I know they teach you to say that in nursing charm school.”
“That’s pretty funny, Mrs. Drucker. I wish there was such a thing. There are a couple of the nurses here who … Well, I would gladly pay their tuition.”
Barbra laughed. “I’m sorry.”
“Me too, Mrs. Drucker. I’m sorry no one can tell you what’s happening with your husband.”
“It’s Barbra Wilson. There once was a Mrs. Drucker, but she’s history. And a sordid history at that. No pre-nup, so there was a really long battle over what was whose. I, on the other hand—”
“Ah, here’s Dr. Baretti now. Doctor, this is Barbra Wilson, the patient’s wife. She is eager to hear about her husband. I’ll leave you two to talk.”
“Thank you nurse Lomax.” The doctor, whose sun-bleached hair made him look like he had just stepped off a surfboard, turned to Barbra. “Would you like to sit?”
“No, I’ll take it standing up.”
“Well, I’m not sure you have to brace yourself for too much bad news. Mostly we don’t know yet.”
“What do you know?”
“Your husband sustained a major concussion, a cervical fracture, and damage to internal organs with internal bleeding. We have stopped the internal bleeding, at least as far as we can tell. We’ll keep a close eye on that. We’ve relieved pressure in the skull with a shunt and medication, and we’ve stabilized the vertebrae.”
“You care to translate that into English?”
“Sure, starting at the top. He hit his head, fracturing his skull and damaging the brain. We did a procedure to relieve pressure from swelling while his brain recovers. He broke his neck, and we’ve reinforced it with a surgical plate and screws. He sustained damage to his spleen and liver leading to internal bleeding. We think we caught all the bleeders. He’ll be under close observation for the next few days.”
“His brain? His neck? Is he going to be paralyzed, brain damaged?”
“We won’t know for a while. We just have to wait and see. I’m sorry I can’t be more definite, but you can be assured, he’s getting the best care in California—in the country.”
— —
Barbra was at a table in the hospital cafeteria, recharging with substandard coffee, when she spotted Dana Carmody coming in. “You certainly have a lot of nerve. Are you working on some sensational twist to your story?”
“No, I came here for you. And for him. I heard it on KCRW. News travels fast when a high flier takes a flier. You look like you could use a hug.”
“I could.” She stood and let Dana embrace her.
At last, Dana spoke. “How is he?”
“Out. Nobody knows yet how bad.”
“What happened? The news report said he drove off the road. The police are investigating, treating it as a possible suicide attempt.”
“Suicide!” Barbra shook her head. “That’s crazy. He was on top of the world, everything going his way.”
“It’s routine in single-car crashes like this. It does look suspicious. Apparently there weren’t even any skid marks. Just straight over the side.”
“It must be the car. You know, he had trouble with that one once before, just last week.”
“Yeah, well, Tensora is already doing damage control, but something doesn’t feel right about the whole thing. Cole told me about that first glitch last weekend. Never heard of anything like that, not for years. In the early days there were some awful crashes with self-driving cars, but not for a long time.”
“You cover technology, right? Any chance you can look into this a bit more. I could turn to people at the company, but that might not be such a smart move at this juncture.”
“Yeah, I could look into it. I even know some people at Tensora. I’ll put out some pings and probes. Anything else I can do for you?”
“Not really. Oh, shit. Becca never got picked up. She might have heard on the news. The poor kid. No, if she had heard, she’d be calling me.”
“Becca?”
“Our daughter, she’s twelve. We were supposed to collect her up at Camp Cah-Wee-Lah by noon. Todd was heading up early.”
“Well, you still have twenty minutes, then.” Dana put a hand on Barbra’s arm. “Look, if you want to stay here, I can go pick her up.”
“I don’t think the camp will release her to you. I’ll have to call Deirdre. She’s the nanny—paid companion, really. We put her on the list, just in case. Look, I have a dozen or more calls to make. I need to get in touch with the Transition Team, get our media management people in high gear. I need to call the camp. And Deirdre. And, I suppose, Mandi Drucker deserves to know, although we haven’t spoken in years, since the last round of depositions. Shit. Who else? Our lawyers, the company lawyers. His personal physician. Who did I leave out? The Pope and the President.”
“You going to be all right?”
“Yeah, I wish I had some company tonight, but Becca is going to be needing a hundred-and-ten percent of m
e.”
“I understand. You have my cell number and my email. Ping me if you need anything.” Dana gave Barbra a squeeze on the shoulder before leaving.
— 8 —
Except for the teak furniture and the bookshelves lining two walls, the office could have been the command center for a security service or the basement den of some well-heeled programming nerd. Half of the semicircular desk was topped by a stacked array of monitors, six curved screens in all. Aram Netsky, the scarecrow-scrawny CTO of Existendia Enterprises, sat in his Aeron chair, tapping away at a wide color-coded gaming keyboard and switching his gaze from screen to screen every few seconds without a pause in the machine-gun typing.
Bannon Turndale, in a retro turn-of-the-century business suit, stood with hands clasped behind his back, waiting for a break that didn’t come. “What’s up, Aram?” he said at last.
“One minute.” The keyboard pelting continued, then finished with a dramatic punch on the ENTER key. Aram swiveled. “You talk with Jerry yet?”
“Yeah. So? He’s on his way.”
Jerry Pendrake, who had mastered the art of being all but invisible, was CEO because he was a money engineer at a company of software engineers, but Aram Netsky was effectively the man in charge, and Bannon Turndale, head of the legal team, was fully aware of it. Aram nodded toward a side chair. “We need to talk, Bannon.”
“Talk away.” Bannon undid the button on the jacket of his three-piece suit but remained standing.
“Well, we have our first subject, and he’s a doozy.”
“If you mean Drucker, we don’t have a subject yet.”
“Technicality. That’s for you and the other suits to handle. My boys are ready to go.”
“The man is not dead yet. That’s not a technicality, that’s a legal and financial show-stopper. Until he’s declared dead, our hands are tied.”
“See if you can untie them, then. That’s what you do. That’s what we pay you to do. Don’t you see what this means? CEO of Drucker Unified, that’s what it means, and he is ours.”
