Socket 1-3 - The Socket Greeny Saga

by Bertauski, Tony

  “Impossible.”

  The Authority grimaced, on the verge of emotion. “We’re not here to play games, Socket Greeny. The memories mined from you were distorted by your premature awakening. Many of them were indecipherable, colored with hallucinations. Broak’s memories were clear and accurate and have been confirmed by security. You two had an argument. Broak instigated the altercation and has been reprimanded for his behavior. However, the fact remains the argument incited your awakening. Provoked or not, this is of concern. All of this has been confirmed by the minders.”

  “Him?” I pointed at Pike.

  “The minders monitor each other. There was no deception on the part of Pike, I can assure you. There is enough psychic power in this room to keep him from concealing anything from us.”

  “This isn’t fair!” I looked around for support, but there were only soldiers looking ahead, letting me dangle. Mom quivered, her jaws grinding, but she held still. “That isn’t what happened, Authority! He attacked me! Check the records. He spit an accelerator through his teeth—”

  “Enough!”

  I slammed my fists into my legs, careful not to step out of the circle. This couldn’t be happening. He’s getting away with it. I glared at Broak, standing at attention. I reached with my mind. Invisible psychic tentacles wrapped around his head. I squeezed. Broak shook, his face twitching in pain, until an icy lance of psychic energy cut through me. I almost fell. The minders hadn’t moved, but had immobilized me physically and mentally. One last cold wave squeezed my brain and I could breathe again.

  “Authority?” Pike said.

  “Continue.”

  “I’m willing to excuse cadet Socket’s insolence due to his ignorance and youth.” Pike’s left eyebrow twitched.

  “Noted.” The Authority leaned forward, furrowed his wild eyebrows. “No more interruptions. The real issue, Socket Greeny, isn’t the unauthorized awakening or the intrusion. It is your stability.”

  The atmosphere tightened. The air moved in waves. I stood straight, drawing air to purge the scraping discomfort of Pike’s mind against mine.

  “Your father was feral, which means he developed Paladin powers outside the breeding program. Therefore, you will face greater scrutiny because of your potential instability. The fact is, there are many Paladins that do not want you awakened, regardless of your potential, because you were not bred. Do you understand what I am saying?”

  I nodded, efficiently.

  This pleased the Authority. His lower lip plumped out and looked to his notes, once again. “Let me officially recognize that Socket Greeny prematurely entered the awakening phase. While this does not prove instability, it is suspect. He infiltrated the awakening portal, a most sacred source of power hidden deep within the Garrison, to complete the awakening—”

  “He could’ve died!” Mom finally broke, stormed in front of me. “He did what any Paladin should do! He assessed the situation and responded accordingly! And you ignore the evidence that cadet Broak incited this premature awakening and you condemn my son for saving his own life!”

  The Authority stuck out his chin, his brows setting his eyes deeper in their pockets. The Commander stepped to Mom’s side, put his arms around her, nodded to the Authority and ushered her back. Her cheeks flamed.

  “I WILL NOT TOLERATE ONE MORE EPISODE OF IMPUDENCE!” the Authority said with the booming voice, shaking the walls on which he sat. “The next outburst will be dealt with severely, Commander Diggs. Is that understood?”

  The Commander nodded once. Mom resumed the pose, hands behind her back and head down, quaking. Pike’s expression softened with a curl at the corner of his mouth.

  The Authority took a deep breath. “This matter is not an easy decision. The committee understands that cadet Broak was involved in a confrontation. We also know that Socket Greeny was taken from the Graveyard. This person who took you there will be held responsible, just as you are.”

  “Pivot?” I said, barely above a whisper.

  “He will be judged when found.”

  Found?

  “However, the committee has voted, 8 to 7, for a continuance to further investigate the matter,” the Authority said. “In the meantime, your abilities will be clamped. You will not be able to timeslice or exercise psychic ability. You will reenter society. The clamp will prevent you from discussing Paladin matters and will remain in place until final judgment is rendered. Do you understand this, Socket Greeny?”

  “You’re going to make me normal?”

  “For a time.”

  Like normal was punishment.

  “Very well,” the Authority said. “If there is no more from the committee?” He looked around and got cold stares in return. “Then hearing 24489 will conclude. You will be summoned for final judgment in four weeks. Please be escorted to receive the clamp.” The Authority nodded to me. “Good day.”

  The wall collapsed into the floor, taking the images of the Authority and his companions with it. Pike and Broak quickly went to a leaper on the other side of the room. Not until they were gone did the glowing circle disappear and I could move. I tried to speak, but nothing intelligible came out. Mom put her arm around me. I tensed.

  The Commander still had his hands behind his back. “You have a lot of questions, but for now there is business at hand. While you were recovering, we lobbied for a continuance to further investigate Broak. If what you believe is true, there is much to understand.”

  What I believe. Even he thought I was cracked.

  He patted my shoulder, but not so much like everything would be all right. More like hang in there, kid.

  “But—”

  “Socket, you truly don’t understand the impact you’re having on the Paladin Nation,” he said. “When you display your kind of potential, you make enemies as fast as allies. Penetrating Spindle’s database caused a lot of concern, but this awakening…” He paused. “I want you clamped so there are no problems while we sort some things out. It’s the only way.”

  Mom squeezed me, again. “I’ll be with you very soon.”

  I could feel her emotionally disconnect. I had always felt that hollow craving for her, the missing element of a mother, but now that I was awakened it was painfully present. No escaping the dull pang of watching her leave with the Commander.

  Or just leaving.

  Spindle guided me to the leaper. He was stiffer, consciously picking each leg up and putting it down. There was no sway at the hips. His eyelight was fixed on the destination. He stepped in the leaper and did an about-face fresh out of boot camp.

  “Where’re we going?” I said.

  “We will go to the infirmary to have the clamp installed. Your mother will meet you there to take you home.”

  “Home?”

  “Yes.”

  “They’re letting me go home?”

  He didn’t answer because he was a program and my question didn’t make sense to a program. Spindle would’ve answered, but not that hollow shell. I could sense his optical gear viewing me as another human, just a task to complete. Once he was done, he would move on to the next thing on his list. And that was to put a clamp inside me.

  D I S C O V E R Y

  Clampdown

  We entered an infirmary with a sterile table in the center. A hood of lamps hovered over it. Three rotund servys waited. The one in the center was red and larger than the others.

  “Lay face down on the platform,” Spindle said.

  I swore I wouldn’t do it again, but I reached out to read him. It got him reprogrammed the last time, but what was there to lose? That wasn’t him standing there.

  When I moved my mind this time, it seemed as effortless as lifting my arm. I could take his memories like plucking apples. The circuit fluid flowed with a steady rhythm, not the BUM-bum of a heart but the mechanical efficiency of a pump. I sensed a fresh set of criterion burned into his procedural code. He had recently been reprogrammed, but this time there was a dimness surrounding his circuits. They sh
ut down his heart processor, the thing that made him Spindle. It was what made him curious.

  Spindle shut down my psychic intrusion, kicking me back to my own skin. “Lay on the table.”

  “What’re they going to do?”

  “The medical mech will install a suppression clamp.”

  An appendage grew from the center of the red servy. It looked more like a talon than it did a hand. It held a c-shaped ring.

  “The suppression clamp,” Spindle said, “will fit between the third and fourth vertebra.”

  “You’re going to put that thing inside me?”

  “You will not feel it. The servys will render you unconscious for the nine-minute surgery.”

  The servy’s fingers were sharp as scalpels. My fingers twitched. The awakening stripped away the mystery of timeslicing. I saw inside myself, how it all worked. I clenched my hands to timeslice, but that’s not really what did it. The fingers were just a crutch, what really triggered the timeslice was a signal from my brain, altering the metabolism throughout my body. I could turn it on or off with a thought.

  And the clamp would take that away.

  I needed a minute. I had to talk with the Commander, there had to be another way. I would stay in the Preserve, if that’s what they wanted. Maybe I could find Pivot. I didn’t have to go home, as long as they didn’t put that thing in my neck.

  The surface of the red servy glittered like a magical orb. A halo engulfed all three of them as I timesliced. Spindle had his hand raised. Maybe he anticipated what I was about to do. I just wanted out of the room. I could figure out how to operate that leaper. All I had to do was reach inside its circuit panel.

  Legs emerged from the leaper door, multi-jointed with sharpened tips. A crawler stepped into the room, bright and glistening in the timesliced light. A red eyelight burned on the front, directed at me.

  They’re watching.

  I let go of time and the crawler vanished, returning to its post, waiting to see if I was foolish enough to try it again. Spindle stood at the corner of the table.

  I scanned the room for a weapon. Fighting was a ridiculous thought, sure, but I had to exhaust every possibility before I gave in to what was about to go down.

  “Lay down.”

  “You’re going to have to make me,” I said.

  Spindle did not move. Instead, ten more servys entered the room. There was barely space to move, but I would stomp them until I couldn’t stomp anymore, if that’s what it took. But it didn’t take the servys to disarm me. It was a scent. Jasmine. I could sense her before she entered the room.

  “I know it’s hard,” Mom said, touching my arm. “But there is no choice. Without the clamp, the Authority and his committee will not agree to a continuance. They want to send you home to keep you out of the Garrison. They want you disarmed and far away. It is the only way, Socket. It is the only choice we have.”

  She pushed the hair behind her ear. Despite the pale look, she was strong. I would fight every Paladin before doing what they wanted, but it only took a look from her, and a gentle touch, to change my mind and to fill the empty ache.

  The table reformed to fit my body. My face fit in the opening and didn’t restrict my breathing.

  “The medical servy is going to place nighter gear on the back of your head,” Spindle said. “It will only take a moment.”

  Mom held my hand. The medical servy pushed my hair around and slid something cold against my scalp.

  Her hand was warm.

  The nighter gear whined.

  My head vibrated. My teeth, lips, and tongue became numb. And then, like a switch, it was night.

  I was sitting up. I think.

  “I’m going to stay with Socket tomorrow,” Mom was saying. “I’ll make the meetings by projection. I’ve already forwarded apologies that I can’t return in person, but I think they will understand. If all goes well, I’ll be back the next day.”

  She was right in front of me, digging through her briefcase. Spindle was next to her, standing at full attention. His face was dull.

  My blood was like syrup. I was afraid to turn my head. It might fall off.

  On a floating chair.

  In a hallway.

  Mom wasn’t standing, she was walking.

  We were just in a room. Now we were going through a doorway. We entered the dank stalactite parking garage. Mom’s car was at the bottom of the steps. Servys stood at the open doors. One of them took Mom’s briefcase and loaded it into the back seat. Appendages grew from the ones next to me and took my arms. Their fingers were soft and tacky. They helped me inside the car and shut the door. When I looked out, Spindle was already gone.

  The car banked sharply to the left and we flew through the wall and over the boulder-strewn field. A crescent moon was fading in the sky as the sun was about an hour from rising. The dashboard was illuminated with instruments, casting an orange glow on Mom’s face, accentuating the lines pulling her eyes. We drove without lights.

  “Spindle had to be washed out.” Mom pretended to steer. “The Authority wanted him deactivated for his involvement in the incident. They suspect he somehow helped you escape the Graveyard through an unmarked exit. They think he had something to do with Pivot’s disappearance, too. The Commander had to compromise with the Authority. Spindle’s personality was deactivated.”

  I rubbed my neck, felt the raised line where the clamp was surgically implanted. The seat sensed my discomfort, wrapped tightly against my neck and applied heat. Live oaks blotted the moon from view in a black sky. We were already in South Carolina. I couldn’t remember going through the wormhole.

  “I don’t like this.” I touched my lips. They didn’t feel right. “My voice sounds weird. This doesn’t feel like my skin.”

  “Your body is adjusting. It’ll take a few hours for your nervous system to accept the limitations of the clamp. Soon enough, you’ll feel just like you did before all this started.”

  “Why’d you let them do this to me?”

  “Many Paladins aren’t in favor of your awakening. The clamp bought us time to change some minds.”

  “You want me to be a Paladin?”

  She sighed. “If they vote to permanently disable your awakening, you won’t be the same. You’ll be alive.” She wouldn’t look at me. “Just not the same.”

  Just like Spindle.

  She took her hand from the steering wheel and plunged her thumb into the moody. I was tempted to pull it away from her and make room for my thumb. I’d try anything to take this deadness away. If the moody helped, then a big fat thank-you goes out to the drug companies. The Paladins had me. Check.

  “That’s illegal,” I said. “They can’t operate on people against their will. There are human rights that protect people from that.”

  “No one even knows we exist.”

  She said ‘we’. She’s one of them.

  “You have to understand, they can’t let someone with the ability to timeslice back into the general public. If a cadet is considered unsuitable, unstable, or incapable, they will alter the nervous system to squelch his or her abilities.”

  “I didn’t ask for this.”

  “No one does.”

  “You’re one of them.” I said it like a right hook.

  Mom took a moment to dig her thumb in deeper. Her next breath trembled.

  “You have no idea what lurks in the world, what kinds of danger threaten our very existence every single second. As reprehensible as the Paladins seem, they’re our only hope. I don’t expect you to understand.”

  We passed an exit that connected to a northbound Interstate, lights flashing. The road was open and long. If we went north without stopping, we could be a thousand miles away by daybreak.

  “We can’t run,” Mom said. “They’d find us within the hour.”

  And checkmate.

  We turned onto the highway heading home. Few cars were in the way. It was close to the middle of the night. Mom let go of the wheel and let the car drive
in auto-pilot.

  “Broak said they assassinated Dad.”

  “Your father was respected in the Paladin Nation. If there was even a hint of foul play, the Commander would’ve investigated the accident until the day he died. You’re father was in an accident. Broak was merely taunting you.”

  I tried to reach out to see if she was telling the truth. The clamp slammed against the bottom of my brain. I moaned.

  “Don’t try that,” she said, taking my hand. “Any attempt to do something, it will hurt.”

  I was normal now. I had no power. It was what I wanted, to be normal, but now that I had a taste of the awakening, normal didn’t seem all that normal. I wasn’t sensing Mom’s jasmine-flavored energy anymore.

  Off the Interstate, Mom took the car out of auto-pilot. We turned left, waited at a stoplight, then made the last right home. Almost eight months had passed. The azaleas were in full bloom in front of our house. Our porch was lit. We silently coasted up to the driveway. Someone was on our front steps. I threw the door open before the car stopped, ran across the grass and crashed into Chute. She crushed me in her embrace, weeping into my shoulder, her chest heaving against mine.

  “I didn’t think you were coming back.” I could barely understand her. “I didn’t think I’d see you again.”

  My heart was clutching. Suddenly, I realized just how much I missed her.

  “Glad you’re back,” Streeter said. He didn’t hug me. He sort of punched my shoulder while Chute squeezed me until I couldn’t breathe. “It hasn’t been the same without you.”

  “Come inside,” Mom said on her way to the door. “It’s too late to stay out here.”

  Chute and Streeter stayed the night. We talked until 3:00 that morning. Never once did they ask where I’d been. Maybe Mom prepped them; those questions were off limit. Or maybe they didn’t care, they were just glad to see me. Maybe both.