The Zero Patient Trilogy (Book Two): (A Dystopian Science Fiction Series)

by Harmon Cooper

  ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘I thought I might be sick.’ She swallows hard. ‘Sorry, it just looks really bad.’

  ‘It doesn’t feel so great, either, but it’ll heal.’

  ‘So, who… did it?’

  ‘OL Officers? People working for Zander Damien?’ He shrugs. ‘I really don’t know. It was pretty dark.’

  ‘And what happened after that?’

  Sterling shoots her the gaze he has given her many times when she has pried too deep. His sister gets the hint.

  ‘Well, I don’t know what you and that woman are up to–’

  ‘–Goddess.’

  ‘I believe Time is the Goddess,’ says Beige. ‘And as far as I can remember, you believe the same thing.’

  ‘I don’t know what I believe any longer.’

  She raises her nose as she quotes the Book: ‘Belief shattered is belief forsaken. It is better to believe than disbelieve, to have faith than practice the faithlessness of those to be deathborn.’

  ‘I’m aware of what the Book says, so nothing new there.’ Sterling approaches his sister until he stands before her, his shadow falls across part of her face and neck. He wipes more sweat away with his forearm, gives his sister a conspiratorial look. ‘I think there may be more to all this than we originally anticipated.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ she asks, shrinking in her brother’s shadow.

  ‘I don’t have all the details yet, but that woman over in there is a Goddess and by her side, I’ve encountered men with bones made of metal and have seen… seen… ’ He replays the images in his head, tries to put them to words. ‘Water, so much water like you wouldn’t believe, and… and other things I can barely describe. They are out there, and I think… Halo and I are trying to get to them.’

  ‘Blasph,’ his sister whispers. ‘Blasph… ’

  ‘Call it what you will, but we will need to be extra careful over the following days. Do you have your shiv on you?’

  ‘My shiv?’ she almost laughs. ‘Why would I bring such a thing?’

  ‘Well, for one, it was a gift from me and two, I had it made to fit your R Boot, so bringing it with you shouldn’t be such a problem.’

  ‘I don’t have it.’

  ‘Stay here, I’ll get it.’ Sterling turns on his heels and marches into their home. He moves through the kitchen and his stomach twists into a knot at the thought of eating more mush. He passes his bedroom, peeks his head inside to find Halo lying on his bed, her hands tucked into her sides and her body straight and rigid.

  ‘I’ll be back for you,’ he says under his breath as he moves to his sister’s room, which is semi-circular and small. He knows his sister well enough to know where she would put a shiv – it takes him all of twenty seconds to find it at the bottom of the prefab drawer where she keeps her myriad cloths and wrappings. He returns to the back of their home with the shiv in hand.

  ‘Here.’

  ‘I don’t want that.’

  ‘What you want and what you need are two different things,’ he says.

  ‘Not everything is violence, you know,’ she takes a step away from him, glances over her shoulder and dramatically turns away.

  ‘What is up with you?’

  ‘I’m just… doing what I need to do to become double.’

  ‘I’ve been double before,’ he reminds her, ‘it really isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.’

  ‘You should never speak of Lily that way. She was the best thing that’s ever happened to you and what happened to her was a horrible tragedy.’

  ‘You sound like Mom.’ Sterling gently places his hand on his sister’s shoulder and turns her to him. ‘Take the shiv; just put it in your R Boot and forget about it. If something happens, do what I showed you.’

  The words trigger a recent memory. Sterling sniffs to change the troubled look he knows has spread across his face. These were more or less the same words he said to Bolt before the kid was murdered.

  Beige extends her hand, which is adorned with shortened finger grazers that are in fashion with young Upper women. The multiple grazers are each about four inches long and frayed on the ends. A single finger can hold up to five grazers and Beige has spared no effort and no expense. He places the shiv in her palm. The blade is about the length of a lizard’s tail, wickedly serrated on one edge and as sharp as he could make it.

  Beige crouches, keeps her eyes trained on her brother. She places the shiv in the sheath that Sterling personally sewed into the inner lining of her R Boot. He’d made her practice drawing it with either hand and from various awkward positions until he was satisfied that she could retrieve it in a pinch without having to fumble for it.

  ‘Don’t be too long,’ his sister says. With that, she turns away.

  ‘One more thing,’ he calls after her.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Can I borrow some clothes for Halo?’

  ***

  Sterling knew he didn’t need to ask, but he figures it would be better than just rummaging through his sister’s dresser without her permission. He selects a modest bindring and some other feminine accoutrements – most notably a veil. Less of a style and more of a necessity, the veil keeps direct sun and sand out of the wearer’s face. The fact that his sister isn’t wearing one clearly showcases her ready-to-marry status – a bold statement.

  ‘Ready to become a Northern Upper?’ Sterling asks as he enters his room. He finds Halo in the same position as earlier – lying on his bed, straight as a prefab plank. ‘Wake up.’ He sits down as roughly as possible, which doesn’t perturb her in the least bit. Bouncing up and down doesn’t seem to do anything either.

  After giving her a final bounce, he reaches his finger out and presses it into her thigh. A jolt of electricity zaps through him. He’s up on his feet, hopping and holding his finger when Halo slowly sits up.

  ‘What the shit did you just do to me!?’ he asks.

  I’ve taught myself to sleep this way.

  ‘Charged?’

  Yes.

  ‘Dammit, Halo, that hurt!’

  You’ll be fine, don’t be a baby. Have you brought me clothing?

  ‘I… ’ Sterling glances down at the small pile on the floor. He bends quickly, scoops the clothes into his arms.

  Good. Dress me.

  ‘You know, for someone so powerful, it sure is sad that you can’t even put on your own clothes.’

  Would you like to teach me how?

  Sterling wishes his sister hadn’t left – she always liked playing dress-up.

  ‘Do I have any other choice?’

  Halo moves to the edge of the bed and lifts her arms into the air.

  Where do I start?

  ‘Are you being serious? You’ve never – well, watched isn’t the right word – you’ve never felt the order in which someone clothes or unclothes you before?’

  I usually monitor other things.

  ‘I see,’ he mumbles, not quite convinced. ‘Well, you should start by… you know what, how about I do it this time and you pay attention for once?’

  That works for me.

  Sterling unwraps the bindings that cover her chest and a single shoulder, and tries his best to not look at Halo’s sex or her cloth-flattened breasts as he dresses the Goddess of the South in his sister’s clothes.

  ‘Stand for me.’

  Halo does as instructed and Sterling goes to work on her legs, his fingers buzzing each time they brush against her thighs. Thoughts come to him and he casts them aside. He gets the sense that Halo is reading his mind, which is why he starts speaking, hoping to mask his thoughts.

  ‘You’re ummm… healing nicely,’ he says. ‘Where I hit you with the rock yesterday, I mean.’

  That was cruel.

  ‘That’s life in the Canyon.’

  He crouches to adjust the fabric, raises his hands to her waist. He keeps his hands there for just a moment longer than necessary, noticing the distance between his thumbs. She’s small, and this fact highlight
ed by the size of his hands and the thickness of his forearms.

  You like this?

  She drops her hands onto his shoulders and he looks up at her. Light seems to spin in a half circle around her head. Her breathing stops and for a brief moment, Sterling feels relaxed enough to fall asleep. The moment is ruined once he falls backwards, landing hard on his rear.

  ‘Sorry,’ he says, standing quickly. ‘Let’s get your veil on. Can we take off your blinders?’

  I like my blinders.

  ‘I know, but we are trying not to draw attention to ourselves. No one in the North wears blinders.’

  I like my blinders.

  ‘Yes, you said that, but work with me here, Halo. I brought one of my sister’s veils. She doesn’t need it anyway – she’s far from married.’

  Will you take them off?

  Sterling sighs. Part of him hates the princess act, the other part enjoys taking care of Halo because it lets him get close to her, actually touch her. He removes the blinders, carefully folds them, and places them in a shoulder bag he plans to bring this time. He turns to Halo to find her touching her face with both hands. The indentation of the blinders is plainly visible.

  ‘Can you open your eyes?’ he asks.

  I rarely do.

  Sterling sees some yellow crust lining the bottoms of her eyelids, something he didn’t notice last time he dressed her.

  ‘Stay right here.’

  I have nowhere to go.

  He returns moments later with a damp cloth and proceeds to clean her face. With one hand on her chin to pivot her skull left and right, Sterling prolongs the process long enough to tattoo the image of her true face on his mind.

  That feels nice.

  He notices everything, the slight blemishes caused by the blinders, the subtle way her nostrils flare as he cleans, her eyebrows, one a few hairs longer than the other.

  ‘Can I see your eyes?’ he asks again, holding her chin with both hands.

  Get me to the Northern Servers and I’ll show you once we return. I’ll also let you bathe me fully, if you’d like.

  Sterling gulps. ‘I don’t know… I don’t think... ’ He drops his hands but Halo catches them.

  Let’s just go north first.

  ‘Got it.’ He lifts his sister’s veil off the floor, arranges it on Halo’s face. The veil hooks in back and has several swaths of fabric to shield the face from roving eyes or wind-blown grit. Each individual piece of cloth can be pulled back and tucked under a band running around the top of the veil, allowing one to modify how covered they’d like to be. ‘How covered?’ he asks.

  As much as possible.

  Sterling obliges. The cloth now covering her face makes her features almost indistinguishable. She would look exactly like a very modest Northern Upper, if she didn’t hold herself in such a peculiar way. ‘So,’ he says, ‘did you take notes so you can dress yourself next time?’

  I think I’ll just let you do it. You seem to get pleasure from it. Also, put my blinders back on, under the veil. I don’t care if it looks strange or not.

  ‘Fine, fine.’

  .

  .4.

  ‘Do you know someone up North or something?’ Sterling asks. He’s just about to start the motocart when the question comes to him. Sitting behind him, faced away from him as always, is Halo wearing his younger sister’s clothing.

  I will find someone to know.

  ‘Always so sure of yourself,’ he says as he starts the vehicle. ‘There aren’t many people up there.’

  That will work to our advantage.

  He turns onto the narrow lane that leads away from their house, past the Sundrop’s home. He recalls the first time he saw the girl who would change his life, Lily Sundrop. She had fallen and scraped her knee, and was just about to lift herself up when she saw Sterling peeking out at her from around the edge of his home.

  ‘What are you looking at, boy!’ she snapped as she wiped the dirt and blood off her legs. She wore the clothes common to all Upper children – a simple kurta and a pair of pants gathered up at the knee. On her feet, well past her ankles, were her older sister’s R Boots, which were likely the cause of her stumble.

  ‘Nothing special,’ he shot back as he turned away from her.

  ‘Yeah, you better turn away!’

  And those were the only words that they exchanged for the next several years.

  Time passed like rats through their warren. Sterling grew lanky and tall; his arms and shoulders, chest, back and neck thickened and hardened with muscle as he did all the chores his father would have done had he not gotten himself killed on Stayed Day. The War Zone is no place for a man over thirty with a wife, a son and a baby on the way, but this didn’t stop his father from joining the fight in an ill-advised moment of patriotic and religious fervor. He didn’t even make it to the starting siren – an overenthusiastic, clubbing stick wielding teammate accidently caved in his skull, and his teammates trampled the life out of him in the opening charge.

  His father’s death; his sister’s birth – a life for a life.

  Beige’s arrival drove him out of the house. She was smart, adorable and funny – even as an infant, and he was jealous of the attention she received. It was easier to absent himself rather than constantly be reminded that he was no longer the sole focus of his mother’s affection; he’d leave earlier and earlier each day and came home later and later each night.

  And this was precisely what Sterling was dealing with when he peeked around his home the day he found that Lily Sundrop had stumbled in the street. He’d been sitting with his back against the wall of his house, stacking small rocks and reflecting on the unfairness of it all when he heard a thud and a high pitched yelp, almost like the distress cry of an animal.

  He’d wanted to help her, to at least say something, but her unexpectedly hostile rebuff made it very clear that she’d prefer him to mind his own business, which he did, until the afternoon of his fifteenth birthday.

  Sterling was returning from the Northern depots when he heard that yelp again. At first he ignored it and just kept moving towards his front door. Then it rang out again; changed to shriek that abruptly cut off. He didn’t need to hear the sound a final time to know that someone was in trouble.

  He came running around to find an older boy sprawled on top of Lily, one of his hands over her mouth and the other fumbling at her breasts. Sterling recognized her assailant at once – Zander Damien – and he immediately put the toe of his R boot right under Zander’s short ribs. Zander whuffed, gasped, and rolled off Lily, who scrambled to her feet and backed away.

  No questions asked – Sterling threw himself on top of Zander and sunk his fist into his face.

  Zander covered up and rolled out from underneath. He scrabbled up a handful of grit, threw it into Sterling’s face, grabbed him by the front of his shirt and rolled on top of him. Sterling couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t cry out as Zander put his hands around his neck and bore down. The world turned red and faded to gray. There was a thud, and then the weight was off his chest as he sucked in lungfuls of air. Zander was off to one side now, wobbling on his hands and knees, head down, and bleeding from a scalp wound.

  No answers questioned – Lily stood with her legs wide and a fist-sized rock in either hand, breathing loudly and ready throw another stone if need be.

  ‘You… bitch… ’ Zander said, struggling to pull himself to his feet. ‘South-loving whore bitch!’

  Sterling coughed, gasped, blinked to clear the grit from his eyes. He was just about to go after Zander again when he heard someone clear their throat behind him. He turned to find a very large Lower with a finely crafted clubbing stick and a carefully neutral expression. It was Pebbles, the Damien family’s manservant and dogsbody. The man tapped the business end of the clubbing stick against his open palm.

  ‘Time to go,’ he said to both boys. Lily had retreated to a position just behind Sterling. She still held a rock in either fist; she shivered and
shook as the anger and adrenaline dissipated from her system.

  ‘Let’s go,’ Sterling said, nodding towards his home. ‘I know a place.’

  It was the same place he would later bury Bolt, and not far from the place where he would one day bury her, too.

  Sterling only knew Zander as the local bully, and had routinely avoided him as a matter of enlightened self-interest; he had no inkling then of the extent of the Damien family’s power and influence. The very next morning, the two OL Officers who came to his mother’s house and apprehended him in front of the Goddess and everybody gave him a practical demonstration in applied power and influence.

  Righteous indignation fueled his resistance.

  They beat him into submission, and then beat him some more once they’d armcuffed him, just because. To the original charges of disturbing the peace and unlawful assault, the magistrate added resisting apprehension and interfering with OL Officers in the execution of their duty.

  Six month’s reeducation gave him plenty of time to think about it.

  These days, he thinks less about his time there and more about the reason he went – Zander. The man has had Sterling by the stones ever since then, and would give them an infrequent tweak every now and then, just as a reminder.

  ***

  ‘In the name of the Goddess, let the sand cease. In the name of the Goddess, let the sand cease,’ Sterling whispers as a sandstorm rages around the motocart. With his Leaks on and his face cover pulled up over his nose the condensation from his breath fogs his eye protection.

  Which Goddess?

  Sterling has the notion to throw an elbow behind him at Halo, who should be protecting herself from the storm right now, not making unhelpful comments about what he’s saying.

  And just as soon as it started, the sandstorm dissipates, leaving nothing but the crisp sound of silence. Sterling had stopped the motocart and thrown it into park as soon as the storm picked up; he would have ducked behind the vehicle if he’d had more time. He’s usually pretty good at judging storms, especially if he has enough time to look it over, but this particular storm took him by surprise, as it whipped over a hillock and carried enough dust to completely block out the sun.