“I felt like there was something special about you, so I prayed. I asked God to help me, to show what you were hiding.” She grinned. “My prayers usually aren’t answered quite so fast.”
“And look where that led us.”
She studied me quietly. “You think you could’ve avoided all this if I hadn’t dragged you to meet the order?”
“I don’t know.” I hesitated, then smiled. “Either way, you’re worth everything I’ve gone through—the dragon, the desert, Babylon, and now Don’s palace. I’d do it all again. We’re together now.”
She took my hand. “You’ve changed, you know.”
“It wouldn’t have happened without you. And maybe Bart, and Chris, and Ronaldo, and ….”
She nodded, but her eyes said she’d moved to the next thought. She was studying the garden around us. She bent over and glanced under the bench, then she leaned close to my ear. “Think we’re being overheard?”
“Maybe. There’s a chance everything can be heard. Don’s androids are walking recorders, and sensors are everywhere. But this seems at least as safe as your room.” I met her green eyes. They were open wide, a little afraid. “What is it?”
She pressed close to my ear again. “We have to decide about turning on your precept, and I’ve heard nothing from God. It makes me worried. What have you seen?”
I hesitated, careful with my words. “I’ve seen myself in Jerusalem, facing the dragon.” Her body tensed, and I tried to assure her. “It’s not much to go on, but I heard God clear as day: trust and wait. And before that, in the order’s hideaway, Jesus told me to let my enemies give me quarter and then, in the moment when the world listens, tell the world I am coming. Well, here I am in Don’s palace, and how can I speak to the world without my precept? It seems like I should take the opportunity.”
“But this opportunity is from Don.” Her voice dropped to the lowest whisper. “I told you, he doesn’t need your help.”
“Think about why he picked you as his woman clothed with the sun. He’s taking God’s story and trying to corrupt it. So, for whatever reason, if God picked me to see spiritual things and come to believe them, wouldn’t his enemy want to twist that?”
“I guess so. But how?” She paused, fixing her eyes on mine.
I thought of how he’d used Charles’s body as a puppet. “I bet he thinks he can tempt me to join him. And if that fails, he probably thinks he can just control me.”
“That’s right. So what are you going to do if you sync up to one of those killing machines and find yourself with no option but to slaughter a bunch of men or be killed?”
My voice came out steady: “I’ll follow the Captain’s path.”
“That’s not an option.”
“We know Don will be defeated in the end. There’s no guarantee I’ll be around to see it.” I thought of her son beside me—in the dragon. “There’s no guarantee for any of us.”
Naomi closed her eyes and breathed deeply. “All who believe in Him have a guarantee. And no one with that guarantee would take his own life. It’s true we might suffer—like being trapped by Don—but I trust God’s plan.” Her eyes opened. “He called you to serve Him at the end.”
Her steady faith made me smile. She’d just had the devil’s baby, and yet here she was telling me to trust God. I didn’t want to think about where I’d be without her. “You’re right.” I took her hands in mine. “I’m trying to serve Him, and I think that means connecting my precept. I have to join this fight.”
She looked resigned to it, or maybe just tired. “You have to tell me everything you learn.”
“I already agreed to that.”
“Good.” She yawned, then glanced down at the monitor, at the sleeping boy. “Let’s head back. He’ll be waking up soon.”
“Still not going to tell me his name?”
She shook her head and stood. She began to reach her arms up, yawning again, but winced and dropped them to her side.
“You okay?”
“It still hurts a little,” she admitted. “Can you grab one of these apples for me?”
“Isn’t that what Eve said to Adam?”
She laughed. “Something like that, but you’re the one desperate to turn your precept on. I’m just hungry.”
I picked two apples and handed her one. “Here, the forbidden fruit. Let me know what you learn about good and evil.”
She looked up at the palace’s tower looming high above us. “I already know more than I’d like.”
LATER THAT DAY Naomi came to my room while the baby was sleeping again. We sat across from each other in the chairs by the window, overlooking the rocky desert hills. We talked more about Don’s offer and Beatriz’s message. We prayed. We asked God what it meant to trust and wait. We got no clear answer. I had waited for more guidance. I had waited until Don sent the instructions. And now I would trust. I would turn on my precept.
Three presses to the wrist and V was back.
My head suddenly felt doused in grease—slippery and tainted. My senses were sharper, but less real.
“Good afternoon, Elijah,” V greeted with her cheerful voice. “Twenty-three days and four hours since last shutdown.”
Was that all? I wondered. That had been in Jerusalem, with Brie from the order. She’d told me never to turn my precept on again. Was she right, or had things changed? Too late now.
V spoke in my mind. “You have thirty thousand six hundred forty-two messages, nine hundred twenty news briefings, and fifty-seven trainings. You also have—”
“Stop.”
V stopped. That shouldn’t have been comforting, but it was. At least V still obeyed. The messages and briefings could wait.
“Why did you tell it to stop?” Naomi asked. “You look scared.”
“It was too much at once.” I stared wide-eyed at her. With the influx of information from V, I’d forgotten I would get access to Naomi’s vitals. It felt like so long since we had synced during ISA training. I checked her familiar digital presence in my mind. Her heart rate was normal, but her synapses were firing at 68% of her normal speed. She was exhausted.
“You’ve got to get more sleep,” I said.
“I know. But … why are you looking at me like that? You still have my data from our sync?”
I nodded. “It’s still there. Remember, Don’s network keeps the data flowing even when precepts are off. More sleep, okay?”
“You ever try sleeping when there’s a baby waking you up every two hours?” She put on her best attempt at a smile. “I’ll be fine. What about your precept?”
“V auto-connected with the system, and she was about to report on my messages and everything.”
“Stay focused,” she said. “See if there’s something from the order.”
“Okay.” I leaned back and closed my eyes. I instructed V to run a search for the names of anyone in the order. She came up with two results since I’d shut her down.
The first was a message from Chris—twelve days ago. V played the video. Chris’s face was covered in sweat, like he’d been running. He was in a dark room. His face looked hollowed, lit by candlelight.
We lost Neo, he said. Only four of us remain. But we will come for you. Stay safe, protect Naomi, and pray.
That was it. The video blinked off. I opened my eyes.
Naomi hadn’t moved. “What is it?”
I told her what Chris had said.
Her head fell into her hands. She was quiet, trembling. She eventually looked up. “I can’t believe Neo’s dead.”
My thoughts drifted to the man’s hideaway in Montana, and all the children he sheltered. “Chris didn’t mention the kids.”
Naomi sat up straight, as if willing herself out of pain, out of fear. “God will save them, if not on earth, then in heaven.”
“If Chris or anyone tries to come, they won’t stand a chance.”
“Don’t think like that.” She sounded poised, assured—the news had changed something about her. “We
must keep praying and keep going. What’s the next message?”
I closed my eyes again. V played the next one.
It was Ronaldo, from only a few hours ago. He looked calm, with the same bright eyes as always. The wall behind him was the same color stone as the palace. He started speaking, relaxed.
They caught me, mon. I’d been bidin’ time, hopin’ to help, and I even got a drone to the palace. But the devil’s watchin’. He followed the sync to my hideout. Maybe he knew all along. He certainly knows it all now. Ain’t no more use tryin’ to hide. They hauled me here. Looks like they’ll be locking me up in the palace’s east wing. Come soon.
“What happened?” Naomi asked as my eyes opened. Her voice reflected the excitement that was surely on my face.
“Ronaldo. He’s here. Don caught him.”
She bounced to her feet. “What else?”
“He said he’s locked up in the east wing of the palace.”
“Then what are we waiting for?”
“Don knows everything we do, everything we say here.”
“He can know everything,” she said, “but that doesn’t mean he does. He’s not omniscient. He can’t monitor everything at the same time.”
I glanced around my room at all the places where cameras could hide. “I’m not sure about that.”
“Only God can do that.”
“Or the devil with technology.”
“We’ve got no choice.” She held out her hand to me. “We’ll be careful with what we say. Let’s go.”
“It has to be a trap.”
“We’re already trapped!” She pulled me out of the chair. “It’s a long walk to the east wing, right?”
I nodded.
“Let’s get baby boy. I’ll bring him with us. Can you wait a little while?”
“Sure, I’ll start the drone training while I wait.”
She hesitated.
“I might as well, so we’ll have more info for Ronaldo.”
“Pray unceasingly.” She turned to go, a bounce in her step for the first time in days. “See you soon.”
V STARTED THE training, and everything changed.
My mind, my entire consciousness, felt like it was swirling through a pipe, out of my body and into somebody else’s. I heard Don’s voice before I could see anything.
“You are inside the most powerful machine in the universe. Let’s see what you can do.”
I opened my eyes. I was standing in a giant crater, larger than a football stadium. The crater was full of ramps and towers and vehicles, like some kind of mining operation. A line of smaller machines was facing me. No human was in sight.
In my mind, I lifted my arm. A massive metallic arm rose in front of me. It was thicker than a tree trunk.
I thought of clenching my fist. The arm’s fist clenched.
I thought of taking a step, and I moved forward, the ground shaking beneath me. And so it went—my every thought mapped onto this enormous machine’s movements.
But there was more. Every part of this body brought a menu of options. My fingers showed: Gun. Blade. Virus. Fire. Darkness.
Every part of me had options. Ways to destroy, it seemed.
I tried to think of a way out. There was no exit button. “Eject,” I said.
Nothing.
“Reboot.”
Don’s laughter filled my mind. “You can leave when I let you. Pick a weapon.”
I tried to keep my mind still, to not think. But I couldn’t. It was like there was something else sharing the machine with me. Not someone. But something … other. It was strong and close. The other seemed to sway my thoughts like a wind blowing a leaf.
Stay still, I thought, but I couldn’t. My mind drifted to the blade option. A gleaming sword the size of a flag pole slid out of the robotic finger. With a flicker of thought, I swung the blade at a line of towers. Four of them split in half and toppled over. Steel beams sliced like butter.
Then my mind went to fire. Suddenly flames spewed out of the machine. The torch blasted into the line of machines on the opposite side of the crater. They erupted in flames, and a group of them charged at me.
The other directed my mind to my left hand, then to darkness. The machine’s arm pointed into the air and fired out a thin, black stream. Far above, the stream sprang open like a net. It blocked out the sky and dripped down, like water poured over a clear glass ball. As everything around me went pitch black, my eyes adjusted. The machine’s eyes, I forced myself to remember. I watched the other charging machines trip and run into each other, as if unable to see.
I heard a roar behind me and turned back. At the lip of the crater behind me was a familiar sight. The dragon.
It roared again. As immense as I was, I still feared him. Even the other—whatever it was that shared my machine—seemed to tremble in the dragon’s presence.
The dragon took flight, straight at me, jaws open. I ducked. The dragon’s bite missed by inches, but its tail hit like a freight train. I felt the pain as the machine crashed to its side. The dragon sat back on its haunches and sneered at me. Then the dragon grew. It doubled in size. And doubled again.
I made the machine scramble away, up the side of the crater, thinking of hooks as my hands began to lose grip. Giant claws emerged and pierced into the rock wall. I climbed straight up to the crater’s rim.
When I glanced back, the dragon nearly filled the whole expanse. Its head alone was larger than my giant robot. It was still growing. I felt like the earth compared to the sun. I had no chance. The dragon’s jaws opened wide as if to swallow me, but instead it spoke:
“Bow down.”
Its voice was Don’s. Silky, smooth, and irresistible. I bowed down, the other bowed down, and the machine went down with us.
Then my mind was in the pipe again, and it poured back into my body in Don’s palace. I’d hardly taken a breath before I realized I was not alone.
A BALD MAN stood there, gazing out my window. He must have shown up while I was in the training, in the machine. I shuddered—still feeling the machine’s power and seeing the dragon in my mind.
“Hello?” I managed to say.
The man turned. “It’s me, Alexi.” He stepped closer. “It’s been a while since Greece, and since you came here. About a month now, right?”
Greece. This was Don’s political adviser, the man who had shown me Babylon. I hadn’t recognized him at first. His mop of dark hair was shaved clean. It looked like his whole body was shaved clean. His once hairy arms were bare. Even his eyebrows were gone. “What are you doing in my room?”
“Don sent me. I would have come sooner to welcome you, but we’ve been very busy with this war.” He motioned to the two chairs. “Please, let’s sit.”
I moved numbly and sat across from him, just as I’d sat across from Bruce—who I hadn’t seen since. “You’ve been here, in the palace?” I asked.
“Mostly. The control tower is complete now. Amazing what the machines can build in a few weeks, isn’t it?”
I nodded. Control tower—that must be what they called the glass spire rising from the palace.
“Don’t get me wrong,” he added, “I’d rather be in Babylon. I’m spending more and more time there. If it weren’t for these zealots, I wouldn’t have to be here right now. I figure in a few days I’ll get to stay there as long as I want.” He ran his hands over his smooth head. “I went ahead and shaved. That’s required for a longer visit.”
“I talked to Beatriz,” I said. “She made it sound like she was going to stay in the real world.”
“Oh, she and I can go back and forth, but why wouldn’t I enjoy Babylon?” His eyes grew distant, then they focused on me again. “You’ve tasted it. Can you think of a single desire, a single sensation that the place can’t satisfy?”
The memory was rich and haunting. He was right, but so, so wrong. Babylon stole souls, made people slaves. I met Alexi’s eyes. “I want more out of life than sensations.”
“Don’t we all!”
he laughed. “You just need to spend a little more time there. You’ll get everything out of life you can imagine.”
“What if I want hair?”
Alexi’s eyes tightened for an instant, then his grin was back. “Of all people, Eli, I figured you wouldn’t get caught up on the physical world. We know about your dreams. Mind over matter, right?” He looked around the room. “In here you’re bound by walls and reality. Don’t worry, once we win this war, you’ll have a chance to revisit. You can have whatever hair you want. You have no idea how sweet my Babylon is …”
The fanatic look in his eyes made me press back into my chair. Did he really believe life was better floating like bald bacteria in amniotic fluid? “None of this explains why you’re here.”
“I’m here because this war’s not over. Don still calls on me to help. And on you. This might be finished even sooner now that you’ve finally joined us. That was very impressive, what you did with the machine.”
I failed to hide my surprise.
“Oh yes,” he said. “I saw you.”
“Have you been in one?”
“Of course,” he said. “Well, one almost that strong. Don doesn’t let just anyone into his masterpieces.”
“How do they work? I mean, I know it’s through a sync, but stronger than other drones. Sometimes I felt like I was sharing the controls.”
“It’s just the machine’s code.” Alexi leaned forward and continued in a quiet voice. “Between us, I’ll admit, I don’t quite understand how it works. Don keeps some of his programming separate from even me. But here’s what I think. It’s some master algorithm. It’s almost superintelligent.”
“You mean the machine has a mind of its own?”
“Something like that.” He leaned back in the chair and laughed. “Who else is going to run things once we’re all in Babylon?”
“I don’t know.” And I didn’t want to find out. “Why does he need your help now when he’s got the machines?”
Great White Throne Page 6
