Remember

by Karthikeyan, Girish

  I stop there, almost the end of the updated section and check the clock, almost 4. I have that thing to do with Dr. Mekova. Martin sees me looking at the clock. He wanted me to just leave him, here. I insisted on staying.

  Martin releases his pad. “Conor, you don’t have to stay. They can take care of me.”

  I give him both options. “I was going to talk to you about that, Martin. I have to help Dr. Mekova at 4. You said you were good here. If you aren’t sure, I can stay.”

  “I’m doing good. The treatment isn’t unpleasant.”

  “Good luck with the rest of your treatment, Martin.”

  “Thanks for everything, Conor.”

  “That’s what am I here for.”

  I leave him and look through the door outside to the expansive balcony with no visible railing. A metal bar along the outer floor edge holds a blue light strip, which must be the railing. I wish I went out to a balcony during my stay. I don’t even remember seeing one near my room. On all my little trips into the hallway, I never went outside. The therapy is too all consuming. Putting one foot in front of another. I go to the nurse’s station.

  “I’m friends with Martin Townsend.”

  “Do you need any help?”

  “I’m going to leave him here.”

  She turns briefly away. “Okay, his treatment is going well. Do you want updates?”

  I take one last look towards Martin's room, half expecting to see him standing in the doorway, ready to bolt after I leave. Of course not. “Sure, I want to leave my contact info. When he gets out of here, he can call me, Dr. Conor Abby.”

  “I’ll put that in the computer. He will be in warm hands. You have nothing to worry about.”

  “Thank you for the work you do.”

  “You are a good friend to Martin.”

  I leave Gary to them. No one recognized him as Dr. Stephens. I want this to work for him. I move through the marble halls. The transformation to slate takes place. I’m at the elevators, go straight to six, traverse the hallway to the research department, negotiate the multi-door hallway, and enter an almost empty office, strange for a Thursday around 4 but a long weekend coming up. I leave the desks behind, walk through one of the empty open-air conference rooms, the site of many communal lunches, and ascend the white stairs. The sight of them gives me an uneasy feeling.

  Inside Dr. Mekova's office, she sits at her desk in an aquamarine satin dress, constructed from four panels bisected by a horizontal border, fused by a 5 centimeter wide stripe, and arranged in such a way that the same color looks different in the bands than on the panels. She looks better than I’ve ever seen her.

  She gets up and stands next to her desk. “Hi, Conor. I’m glad you're willing to help me.”

  “I’m doing good. Thanks for asking. I’m ready to help any way I can.” That was the agreement.

  “You’ll have to excuse my attire." She puts her hand across her belly, "Some people I’ll be working with next week, wanted to have a gathering to meet me. We can avoid some of the awkward moments inherent to a first day. They decided to meet at a formal restaurant.”

  “It's going to be fun.”

  “I don’t think so. It is just a work thing with people I haven’t even met yet.”

  “Okay,” I say more sternly than I should have. Two weeks ago, I was sure she had nothing to do with Deep Intelligent Thinkers (DIT). Last week she said ‘wasn’t it beautiful how the light illuminated the entirety of the carbon collection lake?’ She talked as if we both saw this together in the dark. She was never near the lake when it illuminated, so she tried back-stepping and claiming she was with someone else but too late. I knew she took me out to that lake. She is DIT. I need to pull it together, my only chance to catch another slip of a phrase. I can report her to the Division.

  “Here, have a seat.” She directs me to sit behind the desk. “Then I can explain the data transfer process. I’ll go to the Windbank center." She parts the curtain and points out the back window at that tripod building out there, one of any number in each direction. "Then send you a data transfer message." Mekova leans over the desk, grabs the mouse ball over, opens a message from yesterday, and steps away. "Okay?”

  “Sounds good.”

  “You can accept the transfer request. Then, just monitor the progress from there.” Irena hugs her clutch purse of a matching hue.

  “I have everything under control.”

  “I can give you my login, just in case you need it.” She holds the purse against the desk, writes something on the desk, and moves the text to my side ‘Id: IreMek, Password: L2em’m8uck5’ She says, “If you can’t do it, I can always do it tomorrow.”

  “Go and have some fun.”

  Irena goes across the room to the coat rack. I notice something. The hem of her skirt becomes wider and narrower along her stride. She puts on the white wool coat. Its ankle length goes well with her knee length dress. She comes back to the desk for her purse.

  “Thank you for helping me with this, Conor.” She kisses my cheek, a remnant from something we both want to forget.

  “Bye, Irena.”

  She leaves me in there. I wipe my cheek. The message should pop up when it comes in. I finally have the chance I’ve wanted to search her server. The division gave me a training mission in computer intelligence last week. I access my tech and start the app with my normal tech id. The cams saw Irena give me the login privileges. The app looks through the entire local file system and off-net connections for frequently accessed files and large files deeply nested in.

  It finds a few files, mostly tables and text associated with her studies, new and old. Here's something unusual, a table from something 4 months ago still getting updates regularly. I skim through the headings of over a thousand entries and glance at a few. I have to come back with a data upload tool, sometime soon for a through look. Unfortunately, no mention of DIT. I have to closely examine all of this for some evidence against her.

  The transfer request comes through. I start it and study everything I have found.

  Extracurriculars

  Wed 8/30/17 4:41 p.m.

  I have given up going through everything (just too much). I don’t even know what I’m searching for. I go back to reading the IMMMR article.

  The unique flight systems have benefits and drawbacks. The use of a standalone magnetic drive system places importance on stealth. The sound it produces similar to a gust of wind. The flight ceiling limits at 1,500 meters. Decreased atmospheric pressure neglects providing enough air molecules. Limited thrust generating capability decreases maneuverability. The use of a rotor/magnetic combination returns a greater sound impact. The maneuverability of the craft improves. The ceiling of such a craft far exceeds a solely magnetic approach. These two systems indicate two different use cases — the magnetic option suited for low level covert operations and the hybrid methodology for high level remote operations.

  A lot still remains unknown about the IMMMR. This just idle speculation stems from the only concrete evidence yet collected — a plan for a prototype IMMMR. These plans present a singular piece of evidence, which cobbled together create a whole host of theories. We cannot possibly know the truth until more evidence is collected. We know according to the plans a diameter of 4 meters and capability for both drive systems. Our magnetic field readings and ionized particle counts indicate a certain amount of magnetic force.

  (—)

  The weight of a carved body presses over me, warm, alive, and yet asleep. I sidle out, trying at avoiding detection, but nonetheless awake the sleeping mass, to which she rolls over with a warm, fleshy hand buttressed against my bare chest, all the while under the sheet. A few slow, groggy, but determined eye blinks bring her sight momentarily to me departing a casually shared bed, before returning to sleep. The day begins for me with the drudgery of entering my strewn clothes in the gloom of a dreadfully early morning, only to invert the process downstairs upon ingress of my apartment.

  "Hey."


  I turn on the now awake stranger, but not quite true, is it? The black asymmetrical bangs and hair trailing halfway down the back, maybe even over a shoulder, then what about those eyes, green, near epic intensity, not common, but familiar. Something displaced turns her brows and cheeks into mystery, something I've never seen before, at least unobstructed, covered with what? Her jaunty chin and angular forehand reminisce of a dream, also a habitual sight in reality. She clings the sheet to her chest — laughable — not successfully with the sheer fabric hiding nothing of her bared form beneath, and she stays up with an elbow propped up behind, that helps her into sitting there.

  "There's something I want you to have."

  What's her name, again, don't know, what's going to change? Not much and I wait, wondering what she could possibly have on her, not uncovered through the night. The necklace, always there, and once in my grasp. The question pendant always perched on the clavicle and hanging down catches the light just right, reflecting onto a place over my hand. She disregards the sheet, reaches behind her neck with both hands, undoes the latch, grasps the disjointed strands, ignores the slipping sheet, clutches the mark in hand, replaces sheet, and holds her hand out to me. I shuffle near as pants overbear, position my palm under her fist, and catch the dropping treasure. Still warm from her, cooling swiftly, and wandering, encircling my neck, avoiding the dangers of pockets overstuffed. Fingering the arc slices my finger open, and sends it to my mouth for the temporary relief sought there.

  The need for a kiss overcomes, she denies protest for probable repercussions, tilting her head back, execution, and a dribble of blood stained, sleep thickened spittle trails from mouth, hers. She licks away the trail, wipes away with a hand, and wrinkles her nose in mock disgust. I retreat into my shirt and wait.

  "You might want to skip the kiss with a bloody mouth."

  "Remind me next time."

  "Feel free to slip away after you're decent. I'm off for a shower."

  She sloughs off the sheet and walks across the hall, shivering in my mind. The final task of buttoning ends with a look around the room at a snow laden forest mural, panoramic bay window, faun colored bookshelf, white wainscoting wall, grey-green carpet, and interior French doors. Proceeding through the door leads me to a snubbed hall with the bathroom behind and her office, living room, and kitchen ahead. The empty office calls with one open door into something I've seen a dozen times, never entering — grey carpeting carrying up the walls halfway, murals of a summer forest above, a horseshoe-shaped glass desk with a narrow inlet, and another wide window out. Back out, the entertainment space divides apartment from door with furniture of slate fabrics and clear descending pendent fixtures for light over an enameled coffee table of red. Looking back, at the black kitchen, white floors, and memories adds no regret.

  Everything turns around just then. The consequences of my actions manifest in everything. The floor fabrics brown with water and colonies of mold, creeping up the chairs and couch, until the covers puncture, exposing the inner workings of cushion and spring, designed for comfort, even pleasure. The workings of stone crumble and succumb to acid acting over time, vaporizing inexorably but effectively into white foam. The enamel stays the longest, perfect till near the last, when a chip destroys all previous hope with the decay and digestion fostered by wood boring insect. The ceiling resigns to dust; invalid beams crack, bend, and splinter as I race for the exit from this dilapidated, decrepit, deathtrap of a structure. A sweltering doorknob — not quite red — bars no action, despite, NO, in spite of the overblown odds against reality. A skin searing burn penalizes the action of escape, into a normal spring rainy meadow, awash with color.

  This too morphs beyond reason, some force or power mutates everything around me, or maybe just me into seeing, witnessing this bafflement. The ground wets, liquefies into a swamp bubbling under the discharge of decay and damp, gelatinous in a witch's brew of sticks, sea grass, sleeping frogs, fish putrefaction, and thawing permafrost. Sinking just averted by a step, quickly resumes the inexorable path towards decomposition, food to energy and raw materials. The escape from which, drives me to rickety, gnarled, weather beaten dock just a few feet away. In haste, a stuck shoe catapults me headlong into the putrid quagmire all around. Righting myself takes a toll, but not much more than any average step. With a hand on said dock, the swamp refuses releasing one foot without the avail of both hands and the loose of one shoe. On knee up frees the other foot, so onward. Then… nothing… absolutely nothing… except white, a never ending, pristine, white emptiness… the whiteness of nothing as far as I can see… no matter either, until I close my eyes and open them into something new… something different.

  The sight of a funeral party filled with mourners, not somber, morose partygoers, but sobbing, inconsolable, dark participants. Me, off to one side, dressed in black, detail upon detail, all black, add a deathly pallor, that's me, invisible to all my weepy friends besieged by surely, my passing. Nature even refuses acknowledging with the bluest sky imaginable, a light breeze, and no hints of pollen.

  "Karma. Is. A. Bitch."

  Nearby, tapping, metal on boot, from gravestone, behind me, Kiros Stephens, one foot over a knee, hat on head, shaking loose soil from shoe with cane, waiting, until… he looks up. Blue veined all over, ash grey, eyes of black, now hat off, fast mover, ungodly fast over to me, throws me down, and strangles me with a stone dead death-grip, all but inescapable. A touch of death tickles my hands and feet, chilling them from life, turning them blue with deprivation, sending them floating away, until I come unmoored, and drift away from my physical body. The senses flee at the last moments, taste and smell disappear, sound muffles with supposed cotton balls, sight regresses with splotches of black. Then, nothing.

  (—)

  I awake with a pounding heart and headache. That was just a dream. I must have dozed off just there, anyway.

  This amount of magnetic force easily supports a 4 meter diameter craft.

  I finish reading the article to the transfer already finished 10 minutes ago. I log off, get my pad, leave the office, and stand on the landing looking over the Research Department, my view starting next week. I look at the spoils of rule. The vanguards of my reign, the gigantic conference tables guard the castle. In the middle the royal highway stretches forth. The hoard of treasure I’ve watched dutifully collected to the right. To the left, the homes of my future citizens lay, though mostly tucked in for the night. A few solitary homes remain up at this hour. Beyond that the strongest bastilles to my power, the research labs.

  I start walking down the stairs, and I notice something for the first time. The stairs — different than most — just horizontal slabs of metal sticking out of the wall sustains no raiser tread. The tread narrowness of 0.2 meters and the railing, a type of glass, floats a meter above the stairs. I look for how it stays up, finding it affixed to the wall near the office door, and extremely stable with that one support. The landing of identical material to the other steps hangs outside the office door. I walk around the front of the stairs to Claire’s office and can’t stop looking up.

  Claire sits at the sofa near the door, completely disappearing into the sofa with a black jacket just one shade lighter. I come around front and take a seat across from her. She supports her feet flat on the floor, under her elbows propping up her hands, which hold a heavily lacquered wooden cup filled with steaming water. Leaned forward with her face within centimeters of the cup, she doesn’t notice I’m here.

  She sits still, statued the entire time, about 5 secs. In the next 5 secs I notice more stuff, her jacket, something she usually wears. The angular pointiness of the lapels contrast with the 7 centimeter radius curves located all over the jacket. The velvety lapels matching against the mate black everywhere else adds another layer. The one button jacket mostly covers the orange full sleeve shirt underneath, whose fabric sparkles to black at any wrinkles or creases. The shirt extends to the base of her neck and all the way to the ends of both wrists. Her pant
s match the jacket with a folded over leg of the same velvet. Her shoes — black leather flats with rounded toes.

  I don’t think she’s going to say anything, but she must know I’m sitting here. I should just get to the point — I can just say what I want to say. “Claire, are you ready for our jog?”

  She opens her eyes and looks at me for a sec. “You don’t have to worry about me. I’ll be there, just don’t be late.”

  “I’ll be there, too.” Dumb.

  She returns a sly smirk. “Thanks for checking on me, Conor.”

  “Anytime, Claire.”

  She takes a big gulp of the steaming water and abruptly closes her eyes, because she doesn’t want to talk anymore. I just leave the office, move through the conference room headed for the work area with the desks, go through the doory hallway to reach the main hallway, turn left to the elevators, get to my goal on ten, walk down the hall, veering to the right, my apartment just inside the curved section.

  I keep my pad on the table, open the closet to find something, get the forest green air-shirt long-sleeve (branch protection from the nature jaunt last time), and an off-white pair of pants with the same air feature. I can just choose any color I want, but it seems fine as is. Air rounds out the options. The clothes can open itself to air with no change in the look. It just feels like the air can come right through. I take this stuff out of the closet as the windows black-out and the lights turn on. I change, drop the old clothes on floor of the closet, while the room reverts to normal. The clothes get collected and stored for me to wash them.

  The memory of that one skirt in there. A flat fronted and backed skirt pleated at the sides haunt me with discomfort. My try out of that garment started with tremendous itching between the thighs until numbness takes hold. Everybody has their reasons, from feeling vulnerable, cold, burdened, or feminine. I get my pad and fold it up to fit in pocket — I don’t need it, but I’m just taking it.