The sky swirled darkly over us. Lightning crackled in the clouds but did not come down.
Scccreeeeeeeeeee!
The portal slipped from Chute’s pouch. I took it and crawled. Chute was next to me, her ragged hair hanging over her face.
A shadow passed over us.
Snow exploded around my forearm and the portal rolled out of my hand.
The crawlers stepped over me. I pushed up and collapsed again. A gash from my elbow to my wrist flapped open, exposing bones and spilling blood. The snow was sprayed red
This is the Internet. This is not the skin. THIS IS NOT REAL!
I tried to run but my legs only kicked. Tried to roll. Tried to scream. It was too much too much. TOO MUCH!
A crawler hovered inches from my face, stinking of burning circuits and baked clay. Its faceless body pressed its sticky body against my cheek and quivered like it was sniffing. Another one wobbled over Chute while a third one bobbed between us, waiting its turn.
It lifted off me, undulating like a thinking brain. A hole opened on its belly, black and bottomless. It screeched, but I didn’t hear it. My eardrums immediately burst. In silence, I convulsed.
In darkness, I screamed.
My sight returned. The crawler limped away, swaying in the silent wind towards Chute to have a turn with her. The third one stooped over me and pressed against my cheek.
My eyes wanted to close but I refused to let them. Chute was limp. I reached for her. I couldn’t let them kill her. I could not let this happen. I forced myself to move, but the crawler corralled my hand, placed it gently on my chest. It pressed against my severed arm, came up with a splotch of blood on its belly, absorbing the stain. It turned pale, looked to the others. Undulated. They abandoned Chute. She remained still.
They gathered around me, lifting me with their twiggy legs. They spread my arms, held my legs together. They’d found me. I was the one to pull apart. I was the one they would decode. They would integrate me into their database and I would become one of them. They would put me inside the duplications. I would become the living dead.
Mission accomplished.
Two crawlers held me while the third one, slightly larger, pressed against me. It wrapped its round body around me, warm and sticky. My cells began to dissolve, liquefying as the world faded.
Gray became darkness.
Would I go to the in-between, or would I just go to sleep, never to wake? Would I awaken as one of them—see the iron rule of duplicated humans for centuries to come? Would I experience every cry, every plea, to make them stop? Or would I see the human race follow them like lemmings?
The time spark beat somewhere inside. It was the only thing I could feel, thumping in my awareness. There was little left of me now. If I took the spark, I would empty my body. The timeslice would suck out the last drop of life.
I clenched my hands and sliced it anyway.
I would slice time to the end.
D I S C O V E R Y
Ripped
I slid out of the crawler’s snotty grip and stared into its maw. What was left of my clothes was covered in slime. The thick mucus kept me from freezing.
The portal had rolled inside the dome. My grip on time was already slipping. I didn’t have much left. Life was fading. I would die in the timeslice and disappear from the world. I would die so the crawler wouldn’t absorb me. Die before they could integrate me.
Chute. I couldn’t leave her. I rolled for her, just to touch her. There had to be something I could do. There had to be an answer. I held her head firmly against my chest and wrapped my legs around her waist, trying to crawl to the safety of the dome. But I didn’t have the strength to even do that.
I need help! I cried. The words drifted silently from me. No one would hear my plea. Not even me.
I convulsed again. The ground trembled.
Time stood still, but the world shook. The sky tore open, revealing a bright red slice through the dreary clouds. I felt the ripping in my chest.
The website was crashing. A crevasse opened at the far end of the tundra, swallowing snow into a deadly void of random data. It traveled across the tundra slowly, widening and inhaling the environment. Snow rushed across the plain. The forest bordering the wide tundra bent under its force. Sticks, leaves, rocks, rabbits… all of it was sucked into the rip.
It would reach us and suck us in as it split the tundra. My evolver belched but unfolded around my good arm. I summoned a whip that fell short of the dome. I cursed, pulling it back. I closed my eyes, imagining the longest whip possible then let it fly. It lashed out, slightly brighter, slightly thinner, and long enough to wrap around the base of an ancient spruce.
My grip on time slipped before I passed out. Snowflakes jittered and danced. The wind returned, driving snow over the tundra that curved like breaking waves under the voracious appetite of the rip. The tundra had split open, the rip halfway to us. The horizon was nearly gone. The details of trees and mountains had dissolved.
The website was going down and nothing would stop it. In deafness, the destruction was eerily silent. The forest began to shake as the rip widened. The portal bounced against the dome, trapped inside its protective barrier. The evolver whip grew taut as I was drawn toward the approaching chasm. The crawler stood tall, scanning the environment. It took only seconds to analyze the situation. Seconds they didn’t have. The rip gained speed, raced past us and into the trees, sucking up branches and snow. The two smaller crawlers leaped, but the rip vacuumed them down. They hit the ground, their spindly legs scratching the frozen ground as they bounced over the edge. Down they went. Forever.
The third crawler anchored into the ground, fighting the rip’s force. The first of the large branches bounced past. The evolver whip stretched. The force was too great. We slid toward the encroaching abyss.
The crawler slid, too, etching tracks in the permafrost. I grabbed the lash with my other arm, the wind blowing the wound open, the skin flapping. The crawler jabbed at me with one leg, impaling the ground inches from my ribs. It lost its hold, slid faster, flopping over the edge, desperately hanging on.
I clutched Chute between my legs. I could feel nothing. The evolver lash stretched thinner. The rip was closer and the vacuum stronger. My legs fell over the edge. Chute dangled inside. Below, the void was colorless, depthless, and dimensionless. She was slipping. I hooked my wounded arm around her.
The entire horizon was fuzzy gray static. The data was gone. The ground near us rushed overhead, curling like carpet on its way to chaos and randomness. My knees had slipped under Chute’s armpits as we twisted on the end of the line. The crawler’s red eyelight rolled around its body and focused on me. It teetered on the very edge.
The lash flickered. The evolver started unfolding. I grabbed for the slippery ledge, slipping deeper. Chute’s legs faded in the void’s depth. The evolver fell off my arm, rolled past me, dissolving below into millions of specks.
We didn’t fall.
Something was latched onto my wrist.
There, bent over the edge, was a shadowy arm, its fingers locked around my arm. A head and torso looked down at us. The shadow returned.
Pivot! You came for us!
Another shadowy arm clung to Chute, her body turning in the wind. He held us there. He didn’t pull us up, he just held us.
[I have you, Master Socket.]
Spindle?
Trees vaporized in the void’s depth. The crawler slashed at us one last time, slipped off the ledge and dissolved into nothingness.
We twisted helplessly as the rip crept beneath the dome that slid down like electrical gel. The portal stuck to the side of the wall, oozing like molasses. It picked up speed, the colors bright and glowing. It broke free, shot down into the ravenous void.
The explosion was silent. Bright, like that of a dying star.
The light consumed us.
No cold. No pain.
In-between.
I was in the dark in-between. Bodiless. Pure
awareness.
There was something different, this time. Another awareness floated with me. A familiar presence.
Spindle?
There was movement.
[Yes, Master Socket.]
Spindle! I thought you were Pivot! I thought this whole time Pivot was the shadow!
[I am the one that assumed the form of a shadow. Not Master Pivot.]
It was you… My thoughts rang like words. Am I… am I dead?
[You are not dead. You will return to your body when it is ready.]
Which body?
[Your skin, of course. The portal was destroyed, releasing you from the sim.]
The darkness moved again. It hummed. I felt it at my core.
You saved me, Spindle.
[Your father saved you.]
My father?
[He imbedded a secret code in my processor. When the time was right, I came to you as the shadow and activated your powers. And when you needed me, I came to your aid.]
He told me on the day I first arrived at the Garrison that he was programmed to assist me. And that’s why the shadow felt so familiar, why he felt like my father. Even in death, my father was there.
Why did you wait so long?
[Despite what you believe, you did not need me.]
The darkness hummed stronger and deeper. I was moving.
The Paladins will know what you did, Spindle. They’ll shut you down completely this time. I won’t see you when I return, will I?
[Master Pivot seems to think they will not shut me down.]
Pivot came back?
[He never left.]
But… the Paladins will imprison him this time. They can’t see the future, they’ll never let him leave again.
[The Paladins could never stop Master Pivot from leaving. They have always known that. He stayed in the Preserve of his own volition. After taking you to awaken, he decided it was time to leave.]
Where did he go?
[Missing, Master Socket. He went missing. They will not find him. But he can always be found if you need him.]
The darkness swirled this time. The hum was closer. It hurt nowhere specific. It just hurt.
Pivot loved my father.
[Indeed, he did. Without him, I could not have come for you.]
Pain lanced through me, up and down and side-to-side. Something thumped in rhythm. Pain focalized in several spots throughout the darkness.
I was returning.
Chute and Streeter. I almost forgot! Are they all right?
I moved faster. Noise was coming.
Spindle! Where are you? Tell me, are they all right? ARE THEY ALL RIGHT?
The pain returned in full force.
Muffled sounds. Chairs and tables were turned over and shoved aside. Muted voices shouted.
“Three kids, two boys and one girl. About sixteen years old.”
“Sir, this one’s the Greeny boy. Alert the Commander.”
“Get the EMT here immediately. Set up a secure perimeter. I don’t want to see lookits within a hundred yards. Clear the room!”
There were tables. A ceiling. It was a room. A real one.
“I need three reconstitution IVs on the Greeny kid immediately,” a woman shouted. Her fingers pressed on my neck. “Weak pulse.”
“How’s he alive?” someone else muttered.
I was on my back. The lights were dim. People were now everywhere, looking down at me. Three of them were dressed in black. The Paladins. They were right there in plain sight of everyone.
“The girl’s in shock,” the woman said.
“Get the minders in here to stabilize her.” One of the Paladins squatted next to me. The emergency worker stared at him.
“Who the hell are you?” she said.
The Paladin didn’t acknowledge her. He put his hand over my head and a healing warmth oozed through me. He slapped a patch on my neck and strength leached into my body.
“What did you just do to him?” The emergency worker was about to call for assistance, but then the Paladin looked at her, thought at her, and she stopped.
More EMTs burst into the room, called more orders and hovered over me. A warm, soft presence crawled from the back of my neck and slithered down the back of my shirt. Rudder hid inside my sweatshirt from the EMTs’ poking and prodding. I could feel his purring against my stomach and how it radiated through me.
“You did it, Socket.” Streeter grabbed my shoulder; his voice seemed so far away.
His face was slack, but he was smiling. My arm was skinny, like the muscle had been sucked out. My cheeks hung. Big hands pulled Streeter away, rolled him onto his back, but he was still smiling. His mouth moved. You did it.
There must’ve been ten people over me. I could barely see the ceiling anymore. They strapped gear around my arms, attached things to my neck and chest, holding up bags, squeezing fluid into my veins. The Paladin put another patch on the other side of my neck. I couldn’t feel my left arm, but it was there. No bone, no blood. I wiggled my fingers. A woman shoved my arm back down.
“Where’s Chute?” My voice echoed in my head. I had the feeling I was shouting, but I could barely hear it. “Streeter, where’s Chute?”
“I need a heart regulator,” some guy said. “Pre-sets will work for now, but activate the nervous relay, we need to decompress their nervous systems immediately.”
“Where is she?” I tried to shove them out of the way. “Where’s Chute?”
The lady put my arms down, again. I didn’t have the strength to break her grip. I looked side-to-side. There were too many of them. I couldn’t even see Streeter anymore.
“I need that regulator over here, now!” the guy shouted again, to my left.
I tried to look between their legs. I arched my back and shouted, “CHUTE! WHERE ARE YOU?”
“Relax, son.” The lady put her hand on my forehead. “We’re going to get you out of here—”
“No, no, no…” I shook her off. “I’m not going, not until you show me where she is…”
A thin finger hooked around my finger, squeezed softly. The woman squatted to my right, wrapping a band around my elbow. She stood, shouted to others coming into the room, moved out of the way and revealed Chute’s exhausted face and her arm reaching out to me. Her finger hooked around mine.
“I’m right here, Socket.” Chute smiled, weakly. Blinked heavily.
We got out.
Chute didn’t let go, her arm sticking through a gap between boots. They lifted the stretcher. More shouts. More commands. A woman’s face hovered over mine. She put something on my forehead and I was suddenly sleepy. They moved me from the room. I couldn’t remember letting go of Chute.
D I S C O V E R Y
Fishing
I was on a beach. The sand was hot and dry and pushed between my toes. I dug my feet down to cooler, damper sand below. The beach appeared to extend for miles in both directions. A ship sailed on the horizon with shrimp nets hanging from the sides. The orange sun reflected off the small waves. Dolphins looped on the surface, blowing showers near the beach where fiddler crabs raced foamy waves.
In reality, I was in a small room. If I tried to dip my toes in the water I’d kick the wall. Just another illusion. Those tricky Paladins.
They put me to sleep after I was evacuated from the school. They kept me like that for a month. They filled me with medicine and liquid food. I had the puncture wounds in my arm to prove it. Their gear decompressed my nervous system so I could hear again, so I would believe my arm wasn’t actually split open by an artificial spider on a snowy tundra. They kept me on that cot and servys tended my injuries while Paladins stood over my comatose body, tapping their chins, murmuring about my future. Their future. Humanity’s future. Mostly they thought to each other so I wouldn’t hear them, but I heard their thoughts when I came close to waking.
Sometimes I heard them come in and out of the room. I could smell them. I smelled jasmine most often. Mom. Quite often, she would sit on the edge of my
bed and push back my hair. Then I’d fade again, back to the painless void of sleep. That’s when the minders would come, penetrating me when I was least present, picking through my memories like looters, piecing together the events of the Rime. When they had everything they wanted, that’s when they let me wake.
They wouldn’t let me out of the room, for observational purposes. But after a day, it was suffocating, so they started up the simulated environment scenery. One morning I’d wake up in the desert, the next I’m at the top of Niagara Falls. This morning, good ole Charleston, South Carolina. All I could do was stand there and watch, smell and listen. “What scene would you like tomorrow?” a servy asked.
“I want out of here.”
“I am sorry, please repeat your request. What scene would you like?” Like it couldn’t understand why I’d want to leave the Garrison.
This morning, the third morning, a leaper shuddered. Mom walked into the room. Her steps landed slowly. She watched the waves wash ashore. The shrimp boat cast its nets. Her expression was stoic, but her energy jittered between waves of hardness and softness. She was not accustomed to feeling what she was feeling right then. It wasn’t often she experienced the depth of fear like she had in the past month, not since my father had died. And nor had she experienced this kind of relief when she saw me standing there, alive and well. “My son,” she whispered.
She didn’t hug me or weep, but the energy around her was soaked with salty flavors. Her hands were quivering. [Allow me a moment of weakness,] she thought to me or whoever was tuning in.
She dropped her head and walked closer to the water. The crabs scattered like she might step on them. We watched the sun get closer to the horizon and the shrimp boats sailed out of view. When she was composed, she said, “When your father died, they wanted me to quit.”
Socket 1-3 - The Socket Greeny Saga Page 19
