Division Zero: Thrall

by Matthew S. Cox

  Kirsten spun about, sighing. “I lost her.”

  “Over there.” Dorian pointed. “Probably in that old car. I can feel someone alive in there.”

  “Creepy.” Kirsten jogged over.

  “All the things you’ve seen and me saying I can feel the presence of the living is creepy?” Dorian laughed.

  “I guess that is a bit lame, huh?”

  Kirsten peeked through the grime-encrusted window of a car that had not driven since many years before she was born. A small figure huddled in the back seat, curled into a ball with her feet crossed. Her head lifted. The whites of her eyes glowed lime green, like the back end of a firefly.

  “Hey, sweetie.” Kirsten cooed through the cracked glass. “Easy, kiddo. I’m a friend.” She tugged at the handle.

  Shivering, the child did not show any reaction to the door creaking open. She shook at a near convulsion, sweating as if it were a hundred and ten degrees out, despite it being the middle of September. Her surface thoughts came on in a disorienting blur. Reality liquefied. The skin of Kirsten’s face melted away in the girl’s thoughts, leaving the skull to chatter behind eyeballs swinging on nerve fibers.

  “Holy shit.” Kirsten cut off mental contact. “This kid is fucked up.”

  “Be careful. Judging by all that sweat, she’s in the midst of the comedown phase; but she’s still probably stronger than a grown man.” Dorian grumbled. “I’d love to find the son of a bitch that gave Lace to a juvenile.”

  Kirsten glanced at him. “You don’t need another summary on your conscience.”

  “It wouldn’t be on my conscience, K. Any Division One cop would end whatever waste of humanity was responsible for getting a kid hooked on that shit. It’s a damn death sentence. It’s so addictive, people have died from missing a re-dose by hours.”

  “Hey, kiddo, come on. You need some food. Let me get you somewhere safe, alright?” Kirsten reached toward her.

  The girl watched the hand get closer and closer to her leg. Just before contact, she lunged forward and stomp-kicked Kirsten in the face. The impact knocked her out of the car and onto her back, seeing stars.

  “You okay?” asked Dorian.

  “Yeah…” Kirsten blinked and spat. “She stepped in coffee.”

  When the girl leapt out of the car, Kirsten rolled left and got an arm around the child’s legs, taking her down. She seized the skinny waif by an ankle and hauled her back far enough to get a hand on the shoulder before the fit of shrieking and thrashing went into full gear. An elbow to the gut lifted Kirsten off the ground and took all the wind from her sails. She fell, both arms wrapped around the girl’s shins to arrest her flight.

  The kid rolled over, clawing at Kirsten’s face. She ducked, wrestling to get control of the urchin’s arms. She still had enough strength left to overpower Kirsten, reversing the hold and climbing on top of her. Her grip on the child’s wrists slid up grimy forearms as the girl forced her arms down and got her hands around Kirsten’s throat.

  What the fuck! This kid is trying to kill me? “Hey,” she croaked. “ Stop!” Kirsten’s eyes glowed white for an instant.

  This time, the suggestion stunned the girl into a series of facial tics. Kirsten took advantage of the mental shutdown to flip the child onto her chest and gather her arms behind her back.

  “She’s too skinny for binders, use the riot ties,” said Dorian.

  “I’m not restraining an eleven-year-old.” Kirsten thought back to how patient the Division 1 officers were when they hauled her off the street at that age.

  “I know what you’re thinking, K. You weren’t on Lace. This kid can really hurt you. Do you want to let her force you into a situation where you have to shoot her? What if she tries to leap out of the car while we’re in the air?”

  Kirsten sat back on her heels, pinning the girl down while she secured her hand and foot with plastic strips. “I…”

  “It’s for her own safety.”

  The girl wailed and thrashed. The plastic creaked.

  “Might want to put on three pairs,” said Dorian.

  Kirsten brushed hair off the girl’s face, caressing the side of her head and whispering in a soothing tone. “Easy. Calm down, I’m not here to hurt you. Everything’s going to be okay. You’re not in trouble.”

  She gave up fighting, going limp on the alley. The whining came next, whimpered pleas for freedom. Kirsten reached for her uti knife to cut the girl loose.

  “Don’t. She’s playing you.” Dorian put a hand on Kirsten’s before she could get the knife off her belt. “Don’t trust anything she does until after detox. All she wants to do is run off and find more Lace. Might look like she’s only a child, but she will kill anyone who gets between her and another dose.”

  A pat down found no weapons, but Kirsten felt something in the girl’s right pants pocket.

  “Careful, don’t just jam your hand in there,” said Dorian. “Could be a needle.”

  With great care, Kirsten extracted a one-inch long clear plastic ampule about as big around as a large drinking straw. One end had a white cap and built-in needle; the other contained a drop or two of a luminous green liquid, the same color green that shone from the whites of the little girl’s eyes. Kirsten scowled at the injector, and frowned at the dark, V-shaped scars on the side of the thin, dirty neck.

  The girl stared at the spent injector, as if the drop or two within it was the difference between life and death. She wriggled, eyes begging Kirsten to let her have the last bit.

  Kirsten, now crying, looked up at Dorian as she struggled to hold the child down. “You’re right. I do wanna shoot the guy that gave it to her.” She sighed, poking at her armband to call the patrol craft to her location.

  eal, as it turns out, can suck the life out of anything when overdone. Kirsten frowned at the walls, at the men jogging past her in the same color scrubs. Even the cushions of the bench she sat on were stuck somewhere in the no-man’s-land between green and blue. She glanced up from her meditative hatred of the hue as a commotion three doors to her right attracted two medtechs as well as a real doctor at a full run.

  She leaned forward, elbows on her knees and fingers twined, staring at the floor between her boots. “I’m pretty sure it’s pointless, but I’m half tempted to try praying.”

  Dorian, seated to her left, chuckled. “If it makes you feel better, it’s not pointless.”

  “I dunno. Why do we keep searching for a parental figure when life gets out of control? The minute people find themselves in a situation beyond reason, they reach for the man in the sky.”

  “People have been debating that question for centuries, K. Humans need to feel like they’re in control. When they lose that feeling, they have to explain it. Random circumstance is so cold and impersonal. The concept of a deity is the perfect scapegoat for bad luck or a valve to channel away guilt at good fortune. Something bad happens, and God must have wanted it to. Something good happens, and he must like you more than everyone else. It’s a way to disavow personal responsibility or just plain bad luck.”

  Kirsten laughed. “I guess I have Judas in my family tree.”

  Dorian became solid enough to give her a light shove. “The self-loathing thing does not work for you.”

  She looked up from the floor to say something, but glanced to her right. The girl from the alley, now clean and wearing a form-fitting hospital smock, walked barefoot into the hallway past a group of staff. A series of plastic tubes hung loose, dangling from adhesive patches on her left arm all the way up to the sleeve, which ended an inch south of her armpit. Head down, she trudged as if being sent off to punishment.

  Nearing, she glanced over at Kirsten and approached to within inches of the bench. The child’s eyes no longer radiated green light, though a dull pea soup color had stained the whites. Bony arm raised, near-skeletal fingers curled in a wave at Dorian.

  “Hi.”

  Kirsten, trembling, reached out and put her hand through the girl’s shoulder. Findin
g the child insubstantial, she broke down in sobs. Dorian patted her on the back.

  The girl sat on her right, swishing her feet back and forth as she plucked at the smock where it stopped at mid-thigh.

  “The seat is cold.”

  Kirsten gathered her composure and forced her body solid to spirits. She grabbed the girl’s hand and squeezed. “What happened? Why are you out here?”

  “They’re still working on me,” said the girl, in a tone close to bored. “I was watching them do stuff to me while I was on a table. I guess something went wrong ‘cause they got all freaked out and threw me in a fish tank. I don’t really want to see it. It’s slimy.”

  Kirsten, still crying, giggled. “I hate those tanks.”

  Dorian got up and jogged toward the commotion.

  “I’m Kirsten.”

  “Brooke. Sorry for kicking you in the face.”

  “It’s okay. I know you weren’t in control. Father Villera called me to help you.”

  Brooke glanced up at her. “He’s nice.”

  “You should go back to your body before they try to wake you up.” Kirsten forced a nervous smile, hoping it was not too late.

  “Why?” Brooke frowned. “I’m gonna die anyway. I got nowhere to go, better I just kick off now before I get raped.”

  Kirsten pulled her into a spongy hug. “No, you’re too little. What are you, eleven? I was on the street too at your age. It’s not hopeless.”

  Dorian jogged over, waving at Kirsten until she looked up. “Brooke crashed. From what they’re saying, it sounds like her heart gave out. Two doctors are trying to resuscitate her now. Don’t have a lot of time.”

  “I wanna go away.” Brooke squirmed, trying to stand out of Kirsten’s grip. “My grandpa is calling me from that way.” She pointed down the hall.

  “What about your parents?” Kirsten squeezed her.

  “My parents are dead. They were fuckin’ gang trash anyway. Shot by cops, good for ‘em. They deserved every bullet.” Brooke stopped swinging her feet. “I don’t want to be in this world anymore.”

  “No! Don’t say that. The system is good to kids, you’ll get placed with a new family.”

  Brooke glared. “Yeah, I’ll sit in a damn government facility till I’m seventeen before they find someone willing to let a scrawny Lace-head in their house.”

  “What about colony adoption?” asked Dorian. “There’s no waiting list there.”

  Brooke gave up trying to get her arm away from Kirsten’s death grip and slouched. “Yeah, girls go quick. They want baby factories up there. I’ll get married off at fifteen and spend the next twenty years pregnant. Yeah, that sounds so much better.”

  Dorian offered a wistful smile. “I think we found someone more jaded than you are. I’ll admit it’s a bit of a chance, but at least eight out of ten colony settlements are much healthier than living on Earth these days. Some even have trees. You might be happy with an adoptive family.”

  Brooke grumbled. “Why do you care?”

  Kirsten drew a breath to answer, but all that came out was a squeak as a distant man’s voice shouted the F word six times before yelling, “Come on, kid!”

  “Brooke, you’re a child. You don’t get to make decisions like this yet.” Kirsten stood, dragging the girl to her feet. “I’m taking over as your temporary guardian for the next few hours. You are going back where you belong.”

  “No!” shrieked Brooke, thrashing.

  “Brooke.” Kirsten grabbed the girl’s head and forced an eye-to-eye stare. “Listen to me. This is not negotiable. You’re letting what happened to you ruin your life. Your life hasn’t even fu―fudging started yet.”

  Brooke’s eyebrows drew together. “Fudging? Really? I’m not four.”

  Kirsten attracted odd looks from the hospital staff as she struggled to drag an invisible, flailing child down the hall. Every so often, a flicker of silver thread appeared at the girl’s forehead; as if reality could not decide if she were a mere projection or a true ghost. Brooke’s panic intensified as she found herself lacking the abnormal physical strength she had become accustomed to having. As a ghost, she was trapped in Kirsten’s psionic hold.

  All the while, Brooke wailed. “No, get off me! Let me go! I don’t want to wake up.”

  A man, wearing a light SecurMesh vest and armed with a ballistic pistol blocked the door to the procedure room. “I’m sorry, officer. There’s a critical patient in there. I can’t let you in.”

  “No shit. I’ve got her damn ghost in my arms right now. If you don’t let me in, she’s going to die.”

  “I want to die! Get her off me!” wailed Brooke.

  Alas, the guard could not hear her.

  The man smirked. “You’re either shit nuts or one of those damn psionics. I don’t care which it is, I can’t let―”

  “ Go away.” Kirsten growled, eyes aglow, bracing a squirming Brooke against her chest.

  The security guard wandered off with a dumbfounded gawk, and Kirsten booted the door panel. With a soft hiss, the plastisteel barrier parted down the center and each half slid into the wall. Inside, Brooke’s lifeless body hung in a tube filled with peach colored gel; long hair fanned out around her starved-thin frame. A cloud of blood wisped around teeth; her mouth agape, no breath pushing it out. Two doctors, three medtechs, and a nurse all whirled at the sudden entrance. The techs and nurse moved to intercept.

  “Out of my way if you don’t want to lose her!”

  Perhaps it was the commanding tone in her voice, or her strange undulating gait, or perhaps it was sheer desperation; the doctor closest to the tube held his hand up at them. Kirsten dragged the protesting spirit to the edge of the tube. Dorian waited at the door, arms folded.

  “You are not giving up. I won’t let you. I won’t let you die on the street. You have too much life left ahead of you, and I’m not gonna let you throw it away!”

  Brooke’s ghost stared at Kirsten, stunned by the emotional outburst from a complete stranger. “Why the hell do you care?”

  Kirsten grabbed the ethereal child by one shoulder and a fistful of hospital tunic and hurled her through the glass tube. Proximity to the body drew the wispy form in, distorting her into a blur of light. The floating girl convulsed, and an explosion of crimson burst from her mouth and nose, rolling into a diaphanous cloud. Bruises and scratches covered the small, malnourished body floating in front of her. Kirsten shivered at the memory of the same marks all over her own arms and legs.

  Face pressed against the glass, Kirsten closed her eyes. “Please, God, if there is one…” she whispered. “Don’t take her yet.”

  Dorian decided not to comment.

  Seconds of silence passed, and the angry cacophony of the equipment changed to pleasant beeping timed to the rhythm of a heartbeat. Kirsten shifted; on the left side of the room, a large holo-panel showed a magnified view of thousands of crablike nanobots reconstructing muscle, cell by cell. It looked like an army of alien walkers invading a red landscape.

  “We got her,” said the female doctor.

  Kirsten looked up; Brooke’s chest moved with the rhythm of breathing, the red by her mouth swirled back and forth through her teeth with moving fluid.

  “Get those nanobots on the cardiac tissue right away.” The male doctor wagged his finger at the three medtechs, gave Kirsten a confused stare, and jumped onto a different control console.

  Stay with us Brooke. I’ll be here when you wake up. Please don’t give up.

  The child’s eyelids twitched as Kirsten’s voice entered her thoughts. A hand clasped around Kirsten’s right arm. The nurse. He indicated the door with a faint head motion, as if asking her if she thought she should leave. The implication was, of course, that she should. Kirsten glanced once more at Brooke, a desperate smile forming at the sight of the girl’s eyes moving beneath the lids. Still solid to spirits, she leaned on Dorian and made her way to a closer bench out in the hallway.

  That was teal too.

  “I w
onder where that security guard wound up?”

  “Don’t care,” muttered Kirsten. “A few more seconds waiting might have…”

  He squeezed her shoulder.

  “I know. I can’t keep them all.” Kirsten made a voiceless chuckle. “She’s not psionic anyway, she’ll be happier with a real family. I don’t want to keep her; I just want to keep her alive.”

  “You’re giving Evan a real family.” Dorian patted the back of her hand.

  “Agent Wren?”

  She glanced left and up at a pair of Division 1 officers. Like most in the city, they were of indeterminate ethnicity with brown skin. Kirsten felt like a phantom by comparison.

  “Yes,” she said, standing and returning their salute. “What can I do for you?”

  “We got a report from the hospital about a minor with a Lace issue.”

  “Oh, you’re looking for who to go kill?”

  The patrol officers exchanged a glance before the man offered a resigned shrug. “Yeah, basically.”

  Kirsten covered her face with both hands, hating herself for not objecting to the idea. “Not sure yet. We’ll have to ask her when she wakes up.”

  irsten leaned on the edge of the hospital-sized comforgel slab, holding Brooke’s hand. The head of the bed angled up, and a teal blanket covered the girl to the armpits. People came and went past the door. For almost an hour, she sat in silence and watched blurs of color go by while listening to the distant din of the hospital. Voices, both real and AI, occasionally came over a PA system to summon a doctor or medical technician to one crisis or another.

  Brooke twitched in her sleep once or twice over the hour, raising false hope. Kirsten slumped back in the chair, attempting to manage her feelings of guilt for leaving Evan at Nila’s overnight yet again. She toyed with the idea of taking a day off and spending it with him, but with a one-week deadline to prevent an assassination, she could not. Kirsten did not want to burden him with the weight of what hung over her head; the simple explanation of trying to prevent someone from dying was enough. Evan did not need to know the police would cause the death.