But she did not take my hand and made no attempt to struggle. Instead, she quickly sank into the repugnant yellow goo to be engulfed by an army of writhing tentacles, dragging her down into it.
Only the tip of her nose was left in view for a moment, and then even that was gone. The surface of the liquid was briefly tainted by swirls of crimson from her wounds.
I am ashamed to say, I kicked the driver’s lifeless body with all my might. It slid a few feet across the wet tiles, leaving a trail of thickening blood behind it.
Chapter 23 – Surviving
Woynek explained that the Elite had no tolerance for injury.
‘If their bodies are anything less than perfect, then they must take their own lives in places like this,’ he said. ‘They are taught, or rather brainwashed, to give their valuable chemicals back to the Ether, to the bio-computer infrastructure that created them.’
By now, I was really upset. I buried my head, in my hands, trying to hide floods of tears. In the space of a few hours, and against all the odds, I had met someone I was beginning to think I could be happy with for the rest of my days, and lost her in the blink of an eye. In normal circumstances, she would have been one in a million. As it was, she had been one of a kind left on Earth, a priceless treasure, and now she was gone.
Then I remembered her saying I was still wearing the televisual star on my forehead. I touched it to confirm it was still there. I was surprised Woynek hadn’t commented on it, but neither of us were in the mood for light conversation.
I was just about to peel the sticky backed star off my skin when I received a newsflash from the channel, ‘Cerrina: Live’, with the flashing sub-title ‘Live from Earth’. The picture seemed to be a duplicate of what I was seeing with my own eyes. The hands in the picture were my hands. Everything around me was ‘enhanced’. Once again, background information appeared to be tagged onto any of the objects I was looking at, such as the recycling pool.
The presenter, Suniva Atrox, who I had seen earlier on, whilst I was lying on Tukarra’s bed, appeared in my field of view as if she was stood in front of me, pointing at the pool.
Suniva spoke passionately, ‘Just a few moments ago, the dissident known as Tukarra 76 committed herself to the Ether. Despite breaking many of our laws, she has re-affirmed her belief in the teachings of the Ether.’
Suniva could hardly contain her excitement as she continued her presentation, ‘For those of you who have been watching Tukarra’s story unfold over the past few weeks, the question is: Should she be given a another chance to carry out her orders to eliminate the dangerous criminal, Rhett Goreman?’
An image of myself floated in front of me for a moment. The image was a new one. It had to have been taken through Tukarra’s eyes, just minutes earlier, in the very room I was still standing in.
Then, in a similar way the fate of that girl, by the name of Suran, was decided on the Moon, a graphic popped up showing three options. The choices were...
Discontinue,
Restore,
Downgrade.
Woynek asked me what I was doing. I showed him the palm of my hand, which told him to keep quiet and bear with me.
‘There’s a chance Tukarra is not dead. I may be able to use this thing to save her,’ I said pointing at the rather silly looking star just above the bridge of my nose.
Suniva’s ghost like image took a deep breath and exclaimed, ‘Vote now.’
A clock appeared, counting down the seconds left to cast votes. Coloured bars popped up against each of the choices. It looked like they were representing a three horse race, with each horse trying to get ahead just before they crossed the finish line.
Naturally, I voted for ‘Restore’; but too few others voted that way. When time ran out, an ecstatic Suniva announced the clear winner was the ‘Downgrade’ option.
*
Smoothly and quietly the yellow liquid, in the recycling tank, started to drain away. By now, I knew I had a large audience watching this with me. They were probably seeing the very picture I was looking at myself, and feeling the same sensations of butterflies and goosebumps, I was feeling. The majority of the audience had voted to save Tukarra in one way or another, and I was happy to share what I was experiencing with them.
I didn’t yet know whether I should be delighted or merely grateful with the result. I didn’t know what ‘Downgrade’ really meant.
Something was happening in the recycling pool. The yellow liquid started to churn and boil. The shape of a woman lying on her back, formed in the gelatinous syrup. A moving platform, made from a wire grille, slowly raised a featureless, bright yellow body to the same level as the tiled floor.
Then the oddest thing I had ever witnessed, up until that moment, happened. The strange smart yellow liquid split down the middle and ran down the sides of the body, out through the grille, to drop into the recycling pool below.
As the thick sallow film parted, it revealed glossy pink clothing. Then Tukarra’s face emerged. Any remaining blobs of the liquid seemed determined to merge and assist each other to run back into the pool. Her uniform, skin, and now her hair appeared to be left completely dry, and her hair was now pale honey blonde - the same as her eyebrows always were.
Her eyes opened, and she choked fiercely. A cupful of the yellow liquid was ejected from her mouth out onto her chest. It quickly gathered itself into a pebble shape, and scooted away to rejoin with its source, in the tank beneath her.
Tukarra sat up and smiled at me as though nothing had happened. I must have been gaping at her, open mouthed. I knelt down and offered her my hand. She ignored my hand and reached out, flinging her arms around my neck. She pulled me down onto the floor with her, clung on, and hugged me for all she was worth.
‘I thought I’d lost you,’ I whispered in her ear.
‘I know,’ she said. ‘I thought I was finished.’
‘Promise me you won’t try anything like that again,’ I said.
‘Okay, okay,’ she said.
I pulled away to have a good look at her. There was no sign of any wounds or even bruising. She seemed perfectly fit and well.
‘I love your new hair colour,’ I said. ‘And your pink outfit. But what has happened to you?’
She wrinkled her nose, making that puzzled expression I had seen once before when she was querying the Ether. However, her look changed to one of intense frustration when she realised the fountain of knowledge, she had been able to tap into from birth, was no longer available to her.
‘There are many Elite who like to play god. It looks like Ellie was unlucky, she has been taken by the Ether. Whereas I have been given a second chance, to live once again, but as a human.’
We were half sat up now, but still holding hands.
‘Hold me please,’ she said, tears forming in her eyes. ‘Don’t let me go just yet. I’m frightened. I can’t access the Ether. It feels like I have lost a friend who has always been there for me.’
‘Did you know this was going to happen? That you would be brought back to life?’ I asked.
‘I knew there was a slim chance. Did you see that presenter, Suniva Atrox? Did you vote for me?’ she asked touching my forehead with her index finger.
‘Yes,’ I said peeling the gold star off my head and sticking it on my blue clad chest, so it looked like I was wearing a medal. ‘I voted to have you restored, the audience chose ‘Downgrade’, but may I say you look more beautiful than ever. You look more, well, human I suppose, but what does this really mean for you?’
‘Well, my lifespan will have been drastically reduced, but I don’t mind that so much. If we can keep ourselves alive for a while then my body will grow old at the same rate as yours.’
She put her hand to her chin, looked up at the ceiling, and said, ‘Without the Ether inside my head, there are many things I will no longer be able to do. On the plus side, the Ether won’t be able to check up on whether I carry out my orders - which I have already told you I have no intention of doing. The Ether won�
�t be happy about that. In fact, it might be the very reason why the viewers voted to do this to me. There may be reprisals on those who voted to save me.’
That made me think.
‘How come you had a televisualisation star when you didn’t need one for yourself?’ I asked.
‘I had a human boyfriend once, but that was over a hundred and fifty years ago, and he left me to become a Scavenger. He couldn’t stand all the rules we have follow. I never saw him again.’
‘Oh, I am sorry I brought that up for you,’ I said.
‘No worries, I was able to concentrate on my work and that has paid off big time. If I hadn’t pursued my career in anthropology, I would never have met you, my homo-Holocene man.’
*
We were still half sitting, half lying, on the floor, propped on one elbow, and beaming at each other, when a a deep throated cough interrupted our dreamy gaze.
‘When you two love birds are quite ready,’ said Woynek - who had been leaning on the frame of the open doorway all the time. ‘Do you still want me to take you back to the Bunker?’
‘Yes,’ we both said in unison as we jumped onto our feet.
Woynek might have helped us anyway simply because he believed in the expression ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’, and Tukarra being reborn as a human would definitely improve our working relationship with him. Having said that, there was probably some other reason why he was prepared to honour his agreement. Like Tukarra, he may have been curious to discover what we would find in Bunker 7, and we certainly had the means to get in there now, thanks to Ellie.
Whilst we had been talking, the wire grille had slowly sunken back into the tank, so Tukarra asked Woynek and me to move the driver’s body into it. The three of us took hold of his arms and legs and bundled him into the pool.
‘You are sure he won’t be brought back to life again aren’t you?’ I asked.
‘I’m almost certain,’ she said. ‘I just didn’t want to leave him there.’
I picked up the haversack full of explosives, and attached it to my back, fastening the straps around my chest.
‘Follow me,’ said Woynek, and we all moved outside, down the corridor to a flight of stairs, bypassing one of the sparklingly clean and welcoming lifts.
‘You don’t like elevators then?’ I observed, as we ran up the steps.
Woynek explained, ‘Can’t trust them. If the Ether wants you dead then it would be easy to trap us in a lift. In fact, we need to get out of here in the next few minutes before that big TV screen advertises a price on your head. My fellow Scavengers can be quite mercenary when they want to be.’
It didn’t take long before we arrived at the balcony level once again. There was still a lot of rebel rousing going on down in the central oasis. Woynek pointed out that the number of revellers had been swelled by several other Scavenger clans who had arrived, and some looting of the abandoned shops had started to take place.
Of even more concern, there were more than just Scavengers milling around the complex now. The window of the shop that sold robots had been broken, and its grey humanoid occupants had spilled out onto the marble walkways below us. A few of the male Scavengers taunted and pushed them. The robots either ignored the men or effortlessly brushed them aside. Around the balcony, a selection of apartment doors opened, releasing more robots from captivity. All of them turned in unison to face us, starting to walk slowly and purposefully in our direction.
I couldn’t help but wonder why we were considered a greater threat to the city than the Scavengers.
Tukarra said she had never seen the robots act as one, as an army, before.
Furthermore, this was the very first time she was surveying the view from that balcony as a human would - without her previously built in augmented reality highlighting shops, cafés, and exits, for example. I could sense she was becoming ever more frustrated and fearful as she realised that the robots, intended to serve all citizens of Vidora, were now completely beyond her control.
‘It seems we may have outstayed our welcome,’ I noted whilst looking around for the nearest way out
We quickly ran past the reception area and back towards the glass entrance hall. There we found the armoured Hippo that had brought Ellie and the Elite driver to the city. It had smashed through the airlock doors. The large jagged hole in the doors, around the Hippo, explained how the Scavengers had got into the complex so easily.
I opened the driver’s door and climbed into the cabin. In a door pocket, my hand fell upon what could only be described as a plastic lunch box. I lifted its lid to find most of its contents had been eaten and only recently. It must have been left there by the driver. Amongst a few crumbs and empty wrappers, there was a block of something hard. I could hardly believe my eyes. A billion years on and they were still making chocolate! Having no idea when we might get another chance to eat, I instinctively stuffed the bar into a corner of the already bulging haversack I was wearing.
I tapped the ancient diesel fuel gauge. The reading showed the tank was virtually empty. Even if the Hippo could be reversed out of the broken doors there would not be enough fuel to take us back to the bunker. Running out of fuel, in the kind of weather we were sure to find outside, was not advisable. Furthermore, that rocket we had seen taking off, apparently the same one that crashed into the Moon, had probably used every last drop of liquid fossil fuel left on the planet.
I climbed down out from the cabin, and told Tukarra and Woynek what I had discovered. I had just about finished briefing them, when crowd of grey robots overflowed from the reception area. They had joined ranks and were walking towards us, shoulder to shoulder now, filling the width of the entrance hall. They did not have any weapons on them, as far as I could tell, but their shear numbers posed a significant threat. I had no idea what they would actually do if they caught up with us. I certainly had no wish to wait around to find out.
Fortunately, Woynek seemed to have a plan of his own. He suggested we follow him through the smashed airlock doors and out into the storm.
The sky was just as angry, and the rain was just as hot and torrential as we had previously experienced, but the wind was now laced with sand and this gave every raindrop a ferocious bite on any exposed flesh. Woynek took out, from a leather poke, protective goggles for his eyes, and a dirty old rag to cover his nose and mouth. Those things would just about stop the sand from getting into his eyes, nose, mouth and lungs, but it was easy to see why the skin on his face and chest had become tough as old boots over the years.
Thankfully, for Tukarra and myself, our amazing suits automatically stretched to completely envelope us once more. Their smart materials glowed bright pink and blue, trying to shed as much unwanted energy as possible, trying to keep our bodies cool. Rain spattered, crackled and hissed off their increasingly hot outer surface. The heat given off by my suit, whilst carrying what felt like a ton of explosives on my back, was just another potential hazard I had to put to the back of my mind.
Woynek motioned us on, up the rocky incline, to where Tukarra and I had briefly overlooked the entrance on our way in. Despite the poor visibility, we began to make out a really odd assortment of strange looking vehicles. They were made from ill-fitting scrap parts. Most appeared to be made from the cockpits of a variety of different types of light aeroplane mounted on top of a quad-bike chassis.
Woynek shouted to be heard over the noise of the endless storm, ‘Take one bike each. Follow me, and keep close.’
Presumably, these machines had brought the Scavengers to Vidora and we were about to drive off with the property of the rampaging mob. Perhaps this was not such a good idea, but we had no other choice.
I climbed under the canopy of the nearest bike and sat on the rather uncomfortable leather seat. Getting into position was quite a struggle with the engorged rucksack on my back. It was worth the effort though. The cockpit structure provided some respite from the constant pounding of the wind and rain, and my blue suit was able to shrink bac
k off my face and hands.
Woynek awkwardly popped his head and shoulders under the canopy to explain the controls to me. He then did the same for Tukarra, before getting onto his own bike, and firing it up.
I kick started my engine, and the whole machine came alive with a deep throated rumble. I noticed Tukarra craning to look through her rain lashed window to see what my feet were doing. I don’t think she had ever ridden on anything like these machines before, but she soon had her engine running.
There was an awful smell. ‘They probably run on Scrab oil,’ I thought.
Twisting the throttle control revved up the rough sounding engine, which roared and sputtered between my legs.
With all three of our engines running, Woynek released his clutch and set off at a lick. After a jerky start and a few moments of panic, Tukarra and I managed to get our mechanical beasts under control, to catch up with Woynek and adopt flanking positions, just behind him.
We were engulfed in the storm, riding at high speed over bumpy terrain. Although it was raining heavily, the scorched soil was merely damp. On hitting the baked earth, the rain water evaporated, almost as fast as it was falling, to remain as a transparent vapour due to the heat. Crescendos of thunder, reverberating off distant hills, seemed more intense than ever. Huge bolts of lightning were striking the ground all around us, and getting really close now. This time it was personal. There was no doubt we were being targeted by the lightning, or whoever was controlling it. I occasionally saw a flash of green laser light, punching through thick mustard coloured layers of cloud; I could tell the emerald beams were being aimed from space, to trigger the gargantuan electrical discharges, and send them in my direction.
Surprisingly, I was not as scared of being struck by the lightning as one might have thought. I was carrying so many explosives on my back, it was painfully clear I would never know if I had been hit. I also had to concentrate really hard on keeping Woynek’s bike in view. I certainly couldn’t slow down or stop, that would have made me an easy target, and I did not want to get left behind, or lost, in the appalling weather.
Escaping the Sun Page 16
