Hannah Workman, a classmate who always sat up very straight in her pod, was nodding. She was one of the school’s best students and I was surprised to see her agreeing with Simon. “It’s true. There really isn’t any point to this class anymore.”
“Sure there is,” Mrs. Worthington said. “What about the Race for the Cure? Even if you can’t see the physical human body, each one of you, this very minute, is attached to one. Don’t you want to know what could go wrong with it? Don’t you want to be informed of its defects and severe limitations? Of the physical and emotional pain it still causes us even as we live virtually?”
“Not really,” Simon sighed.
Inara chatted me. Blah, blah, blah. Mrs. Worthington loves to ramble.
Shhhh, I chatted back.
Inara pursed her lips.
I stared intently at Mrs. Worthington, waiting for her to go on.
“But isn’t it a miracle how living virtually saves us from nearly all of the body’s horrors?” she asked. Mrs. Worthington went on to talk about the way skin withers and dies from exposure to the sun and how the sheer presence of the body among real nature and other people makes it prone to disease; how humans pass viruses from one to another by the mere touch of a hand and sometimes just by breathing the air.
Death was around every corner, in other words.
The best we could do was stay plugged in, she explained, our bodies isolated from others.
“What a relief the border closed, hmmm?” Mrs. Worthington said, just before class ended. “What a lucky group of sixteens you turned out to be! You’ve all been liberated from experiencing those bodily perils and problems firsthand and for free! Even you Singles!”
The rest of the day, her words echoed in my head. I kept thinking about my mother and sister, who’d never had a choice but to live in the real body, risking disease and death every day. I hoped they were living in their bodies still, all in one piece. If they could do it, then why should it be any different for me?
For any of us, really?
7
Research
IT WAS NEARLY midnight, the hour of shutdown. The physical brain needed a break, especially in younger, still-developing, plugged-in bodies. By the time you became a sixteen, you grew to resent this rule. Inara couldn’t wait until we could be up twenty-four seven like every other Over Eighteen in the City.
I couldn’t stop fidgeting, so I sent Adam and Sylvia a chat. Let’s talk. My room, ASAP.
Sylvia was the first one to arrive.
“Thanks for coming,” I said.
She nodded hello, but didn’t speak. I couldn’t decide whether she was unfriendly or shy. Adam was right behind her. He stood awkwardly in the doorway.
“We should discuss what’s going on,” I said. “Don’t you think?”
Sylvia’s expression was blank.
Adam’s hand went to the back of his neck, as though it was hurting him. “Yeah, we should probably . . . um. . . the . . . the . . .” Adam trailed off, unable to find the right words.
Sylvia began to blink rapidly, like there was something in her eyes she wanted to get out. Like they were hurting her.
Virtual tears began to roll down both of their faces.
“Are you guys all right?” I asked, looking from one to the other.
Just then, a faint static started up in my brain. It got louder and louder, my mind growing colder until it felt as though the insides of my head were made of ice. All the air seemed to be sucked out of me. I put my hands to my cheeks and they came away wet.
I was weeping, too.
That was when the download started.
It hit the three of us like a piano dropped from above. We fell to the floor—there was no resisting the force of it. I spread my fingers wide, crouching, leaning into my palms, but I couldn’t even hold myself up that far. Soon my cheek was pressed against the hard blue wood. I forced my eyes open and found myself looking into Sylvia’s silver ones. They were full of terror.
Information started to appear in my brain, images of a darkened house, broken windows, an ominous tree, its long spidery branches like fingers, a three-dimensional map with an arrow pointing to a single location, its edges sharp and gleaming like the blade of a knife.
Then, a voice. High and piercing. My hands went to my ears, my eyes, my face. The sound seemed to reverberate nowhere and everywhere at once.
“Friday night! Be there at eleven p.m.! We unplug at midnight!”
Lacy Mills.
Each of her words was a scream. I fought against them, pushing the noise away with my mind.
It was as if Lacy knew we’d come together for a meeting without her. And maybe she did. Maybe this was her way of reminding us that she was in control, that she could punish us whenever she felt like it.
At least while we were still in the App World.
“You think this is painful now?” she shouted. “Wait until we unplug! You’ve never known pain until you see what it’s like to leave this world and wake up in the real body! Consider this a taste of what’s to come!” There was a slight pause. “Tell anyone and you’re virtually dead,” she finished.
Then the noise, the static, the debilitating cold disappeared.
The three of us were left curled into balls on the floor of my room. I tried to steady my breathing, began to stretch my legs and sit up. The atmosphere seemed to ooze and I couldn’t see clearly.
Adam groaned.
Sylvia didn’t move.
I was the first one to stand. Then Sylvia got up and slumped against the wall. Next was Adam, who swayed in the middle of the room like a breeze was buffeting him.
I waited until their eyes seemed to focus. “I can’t believe Lacy just broke through my chat walls like that.”
Adam ran a hand across his brow. “I can.”
Sylvia’s face was still shiny with tears, so shiny her virtual skin seemed to be made of plastic. “I’ve never experienced a remote download. I’ve heard of their existence, but, I mean, they’re illegal. You can’t force an App into someone’s code.”
I braced my hand on top of a table to keep myself upright. I was so tired I worried my brain might shut down. “Lacy’s obviously showing us how powerful she is. Showing off those resources she was talking about last night.”
Adam gripped the doorframe hard, like he might want to rip a chunk out of it. He studied me. “You recovered awfully quick.”
“Not really,” I said, and shrugged it off.
Sylvia wiped the tears from her cheek. “Do you think she was telling the truth about the pain of unplugging? Or was she just trying to scare us?”
I’d wondered the same thing. Was this really a glimpse of the mental pain and suffering we should expect? The three of us looked at one another, contemplating this. Adam stopped swaying. Sylvia started to straighten up, able to stand on her own again.
“I don’t know,” I said. “But Lacy did say she loved to play games. Maybe she’s playing one right now.”
Adam’s cheeks flashed with anger. “I already hate that girl.”
I put a finger to my lips in warning. “Careful. She’s probably in our heads right now. We don’t want her to go back on our deal.”
“She won’t,” Adam said simply. “She wants to rescue Rain.”
“Regardless of Lacy,” I began, “the three of us need to stick together. When we get to the Real World we’ll be all we have. Yet here we are, about to break the law, and none of us knows much about anyone else.” I paused, thinking about how to rectify this. “We all must have good reasons to unplug, right? I think we should start by talking about our priorities.” I looked at Sylvia and her eyes shifted away. Then I turned to Adam, who was staring back with confidence. “My reason for unplugging is to see my family,” I offered. “I have a mother and a sister in the Real World. And Adam’s reason is his girlfriend. And maybe family, too?” I asked him.
“No. I don’t have any family,” he said, and left it at that.
Sylvia wa
s still avoiding our eyes.
“What’s your reason?” I asked her.
“It’s kind of private,” she said in a small voice.
“We need to be honest with one another,” Adam said. “We need to be able to trust one another.”
She turned to him. “My reason is the same as yours.”
His eyebrows went up. “You have a boyfriend who got left in the Real World?”
She shook her head. “Not a boyfriend,” she said. “A girlfriend.”
“Who?” Adam asked.
She looked at the floor.
I tried to remember if I’d ever seen Sylvia with someone else during the last couple of years, but I barely remembered seeing her at all. “You know what, Sylvia? It’s okay. Thanks for telling us that much.” I called up the time. It was nearly curfew. I breathed in deeply, my mind becoming crystal clear. “As for Loner Town on Friday, I’ll go first,” I offered. “I’ll leave at nine thirty. How about you leave at ten, Adam? And you leave at ten thirty, Sylvia?”
Adam and Sylvia looked at each other.
“Sure,” Sylvia said.
She didn’t sound at all sure though.
Adam shifted from one foot to the other, unable to stay still. “Sounds like we have a plan.” He nodded in my direction. “And it’s true, we need to work together.” He laughed a little to himself. “Lacy did call us the Three Musketeers.”
I joined in Adam’s laughter. So did Sylvia. I think it was the first time all three of us were smiling. It was the first moment I felt some hope, too, that everything might be okay. That we all could stick together, and rely on one another. “Yes, she did,” I said to Adam. “The Three Musketeers, but less valiant and definitely not as good-looking.”
Adam shrugged. “Who knows what we really look like? We won’t find out until we unplug and see our bodies.”
“True,” Sylvia said.
Adam got a strange look on his face—I think it might have been a grin. Slowly, he extended his hand into the center of the circle we made. “All for one,” he started.
The smile on my face grew as I realized where he was going. The thought Adam and I are going to be friends flashed across my brain. I reached out my hand and joined it with his. Sylvia was next.
“And one for all,” we said, laughing.
We stayed like that for a while, looking at one another. Then the bells for curfew started to chime in our minds and flash along the walls. Adam was turning to go. So was Sylvia.
“Will I see you both at the funeral tomorrow?” I asked before they could walk out the door.
Adam snapped back to attention. “You’re going?” He sounded incredulous. His voice had an edge.
All that goodwill from just a moment before—I could already see it slipping away. “What about Parvda?” I asked. “Isn’t the funeral for her, too?”
He shook his head in disgust. “It is, but I don’t have access to that kind of capital. The funeral is for App World families and Parvda was a Single,” he said. “It’s all a big sham anyway. Just a pageant for rich people to show off.” He narrowed his eyes. “I can’t believe you’re going.”
“Adam, I should’ve known. I’m sorry, I—”
“Save your excuses for someone who cares. See you Friday,” he said, and stormed off, leaving me and Sylvia.
“You’re not going to the funeral, either,” I stated. My tone was flat. I felt deflated.
She shook her head. A tear escaped her eye and ran down her cheek.
“If you tell me your girlfriend’s name, I’ll look for her hologram.”
“That’s okay,” she said. “But thanks anyway. Good night, Skye,” she added in her quiet voice, before leaving the room, her footsteps silent. Like no one was there at all.
I suddenly felt so alone. I went to my narrow bed and sat. I pulled my knees to my chest and rested my chin there, looking around at the tiny room where I’d lived ever since I’d appeared in this world. Everything was a different shade of blue. The chair in the corner and the color of the walls. Even the floor was coded to resemble the sea. Blue like the ocean and blue like the sky. Ever since I was small, I’d always wanted blue around me, blue everything, blue everywhere.
Unlike the view from Inara’s house onto the skyscrapers of the City, my view was of a courtyard walled in by darkness. The dream of earning enough capital to afford a place where I could see the stars and the clouds used to be so important to me. But those dreams felt far away at the moment.
And so irrelevant.
The bargain we made with Lacy was my worry now.
She might be able to go poking around in our heads whenever she wanted, but she was famous, which meant she had no privacy at all. I wanted a better handle on her. What made her tick? What did she care about most in this world? I needed to find her weaknesses, those vulnerabilities I might be able to exploit one day for sheer survival. Maybe it made me a bad person to think this way, to contemplate how I might bribe or threaten Lacy to get what I needed done. Or maybe it just made me smart.
I raised my hand to call up my App Store.
Icons immediately swirled around me. Apps were designed to make you feel like you were the center of their universe, to make you burn with desire. The pricier ones flashed images of me doing all sorts of things—dancing on a stage, accepting an award in front of an audience of millions, walking a catwalk. One showed me kissing a gorgeous boy and another, kissing a beautiful girl. The gaming ones were always the most tempting. I found it hard to resist a landscape where I could swim across a wide, raging river or one that tested my skills at avoiding predators like a two-headed dragon or a field of vicious tigers.
Thoughts of tigers reminded me of that hologram with Rain.
And I remembered my purpose.
“Lacy Mills,” I said out loud.
The icons shifted, replaced by a seemingly endless number to do with Lacy, so many they filled every inch of space around me, all of them boasting footage from her life. Lacy as a baby, crawling across a floor of gold in the Millses’ mansion. Lacy as a toddler, frolicking in the grand kiddie pool in her room. One of the more prominent icons was of Lacy as a child, maybe a girl of six or seven. The image that played over and over was of Lacy trying to get the attention of her parents, calling to them, with them acting as though she wasn’t there. The way the icon repeated itself, trying to tempt me to download it, was like watching Lacy get abandoned by her family again and again. I almost couldn’t look away, even as it pained me to see it.
I shifted uncomfortably.
Once again, the thought that maybe Lacy and I had more in common than I’d originally believed passed through me.
I shook this away. Now wasn’t the time to analyze Lacy’s relationship with her family. I had to figure out which of the thousands of hours of footage would be useful, otherwise I’d be here for years watching Lacy without getting anywhere. Besides, when Lacy was the center of gossip, the App sponsors wanted you to look at her, and footage was free, but when she wasn’t, you had to pay. This meant I would have to be choosy.
I tapped my chin, trying to remember some of the rules our teachers talked about for how to get what you need from the Apps. Hologram footage naturally came up in chronological order, requiring a person to pick the moment in time desired to watch. But if you didn’t know the specific time you wanted, you could change how the icons were organized, according to topic or download characteristics.
One subject was more obvious than the others.
“Rain Holt,” I said.
Immediately, the footage was reduced by years. At least half the icons blinked out, but so many remained. All the time Lacy and Rain spent together outside of school and in the same vicinity would be included among the icons still swirling around me.
How to get through everything to what I wanted?
“Give me the ten priciest Lacy Mills and Rain Holt moments,” I tried next.
Now, almost all of the Apps vanished. No longer did the icons tempt me with
images of Lacy dancing at a club or partying in outer space. All I saw was their price.
My jaw fell open.
The cost of watching these ten interactions between Lacy and Rain required more capital than I spent in a month of gaming. I checked the balance in my account and did some calculations. If I started with the priciest downloads and went from there, I could more or less afford . . . three. Buying the right to see a few minutes of Lacy and Rain would drain away all the capital I had left in the world.
But then, what did I need capital for if I was about to unplug?
I reached out and touched the priciest one.
A hologram of Lacy immediately materialized in the room. She wore a short, tight dress that looked like it was made of diamonds. It sparkled like the green on her fingernails. Her hair was pulled back from her face, intricately twisted and braided with shimmery flowers. She looked beautiful.
I sat down on my bed to watch whatever happened next.
“There’s something you need to know,” Lacy said. She smiled and posed, jutting out her hip. She knew all her voyeurs were watching. She was playing to them. “It’s been on my mind for a long time.”
Rain appeared alongside her in the hologram. He leaned against the wall behind him, looking bored, like always. His black T-shirt revealed a sliver of skin at his waist. “Now isn’t a good time, Lacy.”
The smile stayed put on Lacy’s face, but clouds drifted across her eyes. “Now is the perfect time,” she said, her voice a little less sure. She took a step closer to Rain, the diamonds on her dress blinking brightly as she moved.
He shifted away. “Lacy,” he warned.
She ignored him. She got so close to Rain there was practically no atmosphere left between them. She placed her hands flat against the wall on either side of his head, and leaned even closer, pressing her body against his. Knees, hips, chest.
Rain didn’t look bored anymore.
Lacy’s lips neared the base of Rain’s neck and traveled slowly up to his ear. But when she spoke again, it wasn’t in a whisper. “I’m totally and completely in love with you, Rain,” she said loudly, ensuring her voyeurs would hear this confession perfectly.
Unplugged Page 7
