TRUEL1F3 (Truelife)

by Jay Kristoff

  * * *

  _______

  Lemon’s heart twisted as Cricket clutched his head and screamed.

  The WarBot swayed on his feet, fingers gripping his metal skull, the glowing blue of his optics flickering like a strobe light. A metallic groan spilled out of his voxbox as he stumbled backward into the burning remains of the monster truck Eve had killed. Cricket fought for balance, failed and finally collapsed, crushing a warehouse behind him to rubble.

  Lemon watched Eve leap clear as he fell, disappearing into the tumbling walls and rising pall of plaster dust. Thunder crashed overhead, and Lem looked around the city from her vantage on the rooftop, desperate. There were still sporadic pockets of fighting, the rev and rip of Brotherhood motors as they tore through the streets. Somewhere distant, she heard Sister Dee roaring, a burst of machine-gun fire, an explosion. But the only crew nearby were dead or bleeding.

  For the first time since she’d fronted up on Silas Carpenter’s doorstep that day back in Los Diablos, Lemon Fresh was on her own.

  Cricket rolled over on his elbows and knees, still clutching his head. The code component of Libertas had been transmitted to him, along with every bot in the country, when Gabriel made his call for Libertas. Now Eve had dosed the big logika with the nanobots required to complete the cocktail. The Three Laws were being scrubbed from his core, the foundation that kept him loyal, that bid him protect Lemon and other humans at the expense of everything else, was being erased.

  And it looked like it was tearing him apart.

  “Just go with it, Cricket,” Eve called from the wreckage. Her voice was soft and soothing, like Lem supposed a mother would use. “Won’t take long.”

  Lemon’s belly ran cold as Eve emerged from the rubble, eyes fixed on her.

  “Just long enough.”

  Lemon backed away from the rooftop ledge as Eve dashed forward. Punching her fingertips into the bricks, she climbed up the side of the building Lem stood on, hurling herself over the lip. She landed in a crouch, rising slow, storm winds tossing her disheveled fauxhawk about her eyes.

  Drawing her pistol, she fixed her glower on Lemon.

  “Don’t, Evie,” Lemon said.

  “Don’t what?”

  Lemon’s pulse was thumping, her body washed in panic. Evie used to be her bestest, her family, and she didn’t want to hurt her. But true cert, she didn’t wanna die, either, and that pistol in Evie’s hand wasn’t good for much else.

  But could she…

  Could she?

  Lemon reached out into the static. The billions of tiny sparks, the current that every living thing on the planet needed to live. She could sense it all around her—in the engines and batteries, in Cricket below, tingling beneath her own skin and, yes, curling and crackling in the shadows beyond Evie’s eyes.

  “Don’t come any closer,” Lemon said. “I’m warning you.”

  “Warning me, Lem?” Eve’s eyes narrowed. “ ’Bout what?”

  “It doesn’t have to be this way!” Lemon shouted. “Just…just come with us, Evie! Come back to me!” Tears rolled down Lemon’s cheeks, thunder rumbling in the skies above, almost drowning out her voice. “You remember how it used to be? Scamming meals and scavving parts and run-ins with the Fridge Street boys? Fighting Dome and grifting bookies and hiding the creds from Grandpa? Remember? You and me and Cricket and Kaiser against the world?”

  “He wasn’t my grandpa, Lemon,” Eve replied. “None of that was real.”

  “Bullshit!” she screamed. “We were real. You and me! You were my bestest! And I’m sorry I lied to you! I shoulda trusted you, I shoulda known you’d understand, because you’ve always had my back, Evie. But I was afraid!”

  Eve glanced at Lemon’s outstretched hand. The wisps of current dancing between her fingers. She flinched a little as Lemon let it crackle, raising the hair on her arms and the back of her neck.

  “…Should I be afraid now, Lem?” Eve asked.

  “I don’t wanna hurt you, Evie.”

  “But you will, right? To protect the ones you love?”

  Lemon knew this was it. The throw for all the marbles. The all-in hand of cards. If they lost here, they lost everything. And not just them, the country, too. Maybe even the world. And it was insane to think so much weight rested on this tiny choice, these two little lives, these nobody scavvergirls from the nowhere end of nothing. It was insane, and it was unfair, because as far as she’d come, as much as she’d grown, she shouldn’t have to make a choice like this. Between a world that never cared about her and a friend she still cared about more than anyone in it. But she knew she had to.

  She had to.

  Static crackling along her skin, in the dark inside her pupils, in the pulse of her veins and the heart in her chest. That heart this girl still filled.

  “You know every time I called you ‘bestest’ that I really meant ‘sister,’ right?”

  The static rippled and coursed, longing to be let loose. But Lemon breathed deep and she let it die. Maybe the whole world besides. But the thing of it was, deep down in the core of her, true cert, Lemon still believed in Evie. No matter what.

  And she let her hand drop.

  “I love you, Evie.”

  Eve blinked. Tears in her lashes. Fingers drumming on her pistol.

  “I—”

  Four tons of burning monster truck came whistling through the air, crushing the ledge and sailing up onto the rooftop. Eve heard it coming, twisted away, the edge of one flaming tire catching her across the shoulder and sending her spinning. Lemon scrambled backward as the ruined auto crashed to the deck, and behind it, optics burning, fingers crushing the concrete, came Cricket.

  The WarBot reached through the wreckage, grabbed a dazed and bleeding Eve and snatched her up in one titanic fist. Lemon cried out, and Eve gasped, the WarBot squeezing her tight enough to crush bone, glaring into her eyes.

  “FIGURED I’D TURN ON HER, HUH? JUST BECAUSE I COULD? I ALREADY TOLD YOU, EVIE. YOU DON’T TURN ON THE PEOPLE YOU LOVE. NOT EVER.”

  “Cricket, don’t!” Lemon yelled.

  The WarBot hurled Eve down to the ground, the concrete shattering as she struck it. Eve’s mouth was open, eyes closed, a spray of blood glistening at her lips. Cricket dropped off the building, more blood spraying as he brought one massive fist down and pounded her deeper into the ground. Looming over her, the logika raised one massive foot, his voice a ’lectric rasp.

  “FREE TO CHOOSE, LIKE YOU SAID,” he growled. “AND I CHOOSE WHAT’S RIGHT.”

  “Crick, don—”

  An explosion bloomed at the WarBot’s back, blistering, blinding. Lemon shielded her eyes as the thunderous BOOOOOOOM tore across the city. Cricket turned, smoke pouring from his ruptured armor plates, just as another round slammed into him, bursting apart upon his chest. The WarBot staggered, spraying sparks, and Lemon looked down the street, caught sight of a Gnosis grav-tank, its main gun trailing a wisp of smoke.

  “Crick, look out!” she screamed.

  The third shot hit him in the head, cracking his armor, bringing him to his knees. His optics were blown out, black smoke and bright sparks pouring out of his ruptured skull. The big WarBot collapsed, one palm pressed to the broken concrete, coolant and oil spraying like blood.

  “LEM…”

  The grav-tank’s hatch opened, and out of it came a silent shape, dashing down the street toward the fallen WarBot. Lemon saw blond hair, eyes like broken emeralds, madness and hatred glittering in his irises.

  “Gabriel…”

  The lifelike came on, dashing to the aid of his fallen sister, Eve still comatose and bleeding on the deck. And Lemon raised her hand, fingers into claws, reaching out into the static and at last, at last, letting it loose.

  Gabriel staggered like she’d punched him, stumbling a few steps. But he only slowed for a mo
ment, only faltered for a second, before running on. Lemon tried again, summoning up her fear, her rage, twisting it into a crackling ball and slamming it right into the oncoming lifelike, ripping the current inside him apart.

  But though he stumbled again, nose bleeding, he didn’t fall.

  Gabriel crashed into Cricket, leaping up onto the WarBot’s chest. And as Lemon watched, mouth open in horror, Gabriel punched his hand through the buckled armor skull plates, seizing Cricket’s persona core in his fist.

  “LEM, I LO—”

  And ripped it clean out of his head.

  “No!” Lemon screamed. “NO!”

  Cricket’s mighty body shivered once and collapsed onto the concrete. Gabriel cast the sundered fistful of chips and cables onto the ground. Arm painted to the elbow in black blood. In the blink of an eye, he was across the street, taking the same path Eve had, up over the broken ledge and onto the rooftop. Lemon fell back, tears burning in her eyes, hate burning in her chest, confusion burning in her mind. She reached out into the static again, lashing out with all she had. Gabriel flinched, gasping, blood gushing from his nose in a flood now.

  But he still didn’t fall.

  “Solomon told me you call yourselves Homo superior. Faith said you consider yourselves the next step in human evolution.” He spat, bloody lips twisted in a smile. “And still, nothing but an insect.”

  “But all life on earth runs on electrical current,” she whispered. “All of it.”

  Gabriel reached up one black-slicked finger and tapped his brow as he spoke.

  “Life.”

  Tap.

  “Like.”

  He moved, quicker than the lightning above, seizing Lemon by the throat. She gasped, flailing at his face as he lifted her up off the ground, boots scuffing, face purpling as he squeezed.

  “So much for humanity,” he smiled.

  “Gabriel.”

  The lifelike paused, maybe at the strange note he heard in the voice, touching the small comms device at his ear.

  “…Faith?”

  “Gabe, I’m sorry.”

  Lemon managed to drag a choking breath as Gabriel eased off her crushed windpipe a fraction. He glanced at her, pupils dilating to pinpricks.

  “What are you sorry for, Faith?” he asked.

  “I just…I can’t, Gabe.”

  He glanced back to the tower, a small, frightened voice slipping from his lips.

  “…Faith, what have you done?”

  * * *

  _______

  She’d stood aside.

  Ezekiel couldn’t believe it.

  He’d stepped down the gantry, pistol in hand, ready to fight to the death if need be. Ready to kill this girl he still thought of as family. The only sister he had left in the world. But Faith had simply stood there, arc-blade held loose in her fingers. For a moment, she reminded him of when they were younger. When their world was bright and new. Staring out with wonder at something as simple as a sunrise, fingers pressed to her lips as she whispered, “It’s so beautiful.”

  And he’d watched as Faith’s blade fell to the ground.

  “You were right,” she whispered. “About Gabriel.”

  She’d looked up at him, suddenly small and fragile, her eyes alight with a familiar pain—the pain of loving someone who didn’t love you back.

  “He doesn’t,” she said. “And he won’t ever.”

  Faith looked down at her hands, her eyes filling with tears.

  “So much blood. And all for this. We were a mistake, little brother.” She’d looked up into Ezekiel’s eyes. “We were something that should never have been.”

  “Faith, I…”

  She’d touched the commset at her ear.

  “Gabriel.”

  “…Faith?”

  “Gabe, I’m sorry.”

  “What are you sorry for, Faith?” came the reply.

  She closed her eyes, tears spilling down her lashes.

  “I just…I can’t, Gabe.”

  “…Faith, what have you done?”

  “I love you,” she’d said.

  And then she’d drawn her pistol.

  And Ezekiel had cried, “NO!”

  And Faith had put it beneath her chin and pulled the trigger.

  Diesel had watched, horrified. Grimm’s eyes had been wide, aglow with the radiant energy he was sucking from the Gnosis core. Zeke had knelt by her broken body, heart aching in his chest. He remembered kneeling in the New Bethlehem square, the taste of a mushroom-shaped cloud on his tongue, with her bleeding in his arms. Deciding the kind of person he could be. The kind who chose to think that everyone had some good in them, somewhere. He’d saved her that day. Because she was family and he loved her and she was the only sister he had left.

  But in the end, she couldn’t save herself.

  Grimm had lowered his arms, the air around him rippling with heat, fiery plasma spilling up and out of his eyes. He’d breathed deep, slowly nodded, his voice reverberating around the chamber as he spoke.

  “I’m ready.”

  They climbed up out of the core to the bottom of the reactor shaft. Gabriel knew they were inside, he’d be coming for them now, they had to move quick. But the gantry surrounding the Myriad sphere was hundreds of meters above their heads.

  “We need to get up there,” Zeke said. “Fast.”

  “Well, it’s a good thing I’m amazing,” Diesel replied.

  A gray tear opened up in the floor, and Deez reached out to the gantry above, and with a brief sensation of weightlessness and the taste of gray on his tongue, Zeke found himself landing in a crouch on the gantry outside Myriad. That vast shape, shining chrome, dented by Gabriel’s knuckles and painted with his blood. His Three Laws, his Three Truths, the words that had driven all of them to this.

  YOUR BODY IS NOT YOUR OWN.

  YOUR MIND IS NOT YOUR OWN.

  YOUR LIFE IS NOT YOUR OWN.

  Four Goliaths stood watch outside the sphere as always, the WarBots coming to life and raising their weapons as the trio appeared before them. But in a heartbeat, two of them were tumbling down into the colorless tear that opened under their feet. The other two staggered and simply collapsed, their persona cores melted inside their skulls, running in molten rivulets out of their bubbling optics.

  Grimm stepped up to the Myriad shell, the computer’s holographic avatar revolving on a plinth beside it.

  “MAY I HELP YOU?” it asked.

  “Yeah, guv. You can open this door,” the boy replied.

  “UNABLE TO COMPLY,” the angel replied in its musical voice. “I DO NOT RECOGNIZE YOUR AUTHORITY.”

  “Got warned you’d say that.”

  Grimm cracked his knuckles, glanced over his shoulder, liquid fire spilling over his lashes. The angel shivered in the heat haze, as if it knew what was to come.

  “You lot might wanna stand back.”

  Ezekiel complied, Diesel beside him, backing away across the gantry to the chamber’s main doors. Even fifty meters away, Zeke felt the rush of blistering heat as Grimm held out his hands toward the Myriad doorway. In moments, the heat was replaced by an arctic chill, the boy sucking the ambient heat out of the surrounding air to augment his efforts. The air felt snap-frozen, the gantry creaking as the metal expanded, a rime of frost forming on the railings. Zeke’s breath was a white cloud at his lips, Diesel stepping closer for warmth as Grimm continued to burn.

  The light was too bright to look at for long, a blinding radiance that brought tears to Zeke’s eyes. But he could see the chrome blackening, the bloody Truths fried to charcoal and then to ashes, the door beginning to glow a molten red. This sphere was supposedly built to survive a nuclear detonation—only god knew what kinds of forces Grimm was bringing to bear, distilling, concentrating, focusing on a single piece of me
tal that now burned white, incandescent with the heat.

  “It’s working,” Diesel breathed.

  “STOP THIS!”

  Ezekiel turned, unsurprised to find Gabriel standing at the doorway to the chamber. But he felt his heart twist inside his chest as he saw Lemon in Gabe’s arms, the girl’s neck gripped tight in the crook of his elbow, a pistol at her temple.

  “STOP THIS AT ONCE!” Gabriel roared.

  He was dressed in black, spattered in oil and blood. Blond hair hung in emerald-green eyes. Ezekiel could see the madness, the obsession, the impossible fury welling in Gabe’s stare. He jerked his arm, and Lemon gasped, her face bright red, boots kicking, fingers digging into Gabe’s forearm as she struggled to breathe. It would only take one twitch of Gabe’s finger, one tiny movement, and Lemon…

  “Lemon!” Grimm yelled.

  The rippling furnace at his fingertips died as he turned to face the lifelike. He was a dark silhouette against the glowing metal of the Myriad door, fire spilling from his eyes like inverted waterfalls. But Gabriel only pressed the pistol harder against Lemon’s skull, making her gasp. Diesel couldn’t Rift the problem away. Grimm didn’t have the control to kill Gabe without risking Lemon.

  Stalemate.

  “Step away from the door, cockroach,” Gabriel demanded.

  “Let her go, bastard,” Grimm spat.

  “Step away or she dies!” Gabriel roared.

  “Then so do you, prettyboy,” Diesel hissed.

  “Perhaps.” His eyes narrowed. “But that will be of little consolation to Miss Fresh.”

  “Don’t d-do it,” Lemon gasped. “Kill this fuc—”

  Gabriel jerked his arm again, making Lemon squeal with pain.

  “What will it be, Ezekiel?” Gabe asked, turning to his brother. “Walk away in peace? Or have the blood of another innocent girl on your hands?”

  “Gabriel, don’t…,” Ezekiel pleaded.

  “I will have what is mine!” Gabe roared, his eyes shining and bright. “I will have what is owed me, what was promised to all of us! I will have a life, Ezekiel, and I will live it with her!”

  Gabriel glanced toward the Myriad sphere, and Zeke saw a splinter of fear behind his brother’s mask. His dream was so close, perhaps just a few hours from waking, all he’d lied and stolen and murdered for was within his grasp. The talk of freedom, the posturing and speeches, all of it had always been a facade. In the end, all Gabriel wanted was the girl he loved.