It’ll be worth it.
Zach and I slowly circle each other, sticking to the edge of the ring. He knows I don’t like to make the first move, but that goes both ways. I know he’s got forty pounds of solid muscle on me, but being smaller means I’m more agile. I’m only eighteen, with two years of training to his five, but I’ve been a jiv from age seven, the day I came to the camp and joined the Makers. Most kids born in-house have to wait until the minimum age of seventeen. Which means Zach’s been cruising on his augment legs for four years, but I’ve been on mine for eleven. And I don’t care what the older jivs say—being born without legs means I don’t have any subconscious memories of walking pre-mod to slow me down. I’ve been running on augments from my very first steps, and that makes a difference. For reflexes. For confidence.
For kicking Zach’s ass and winning the right to claim the shop’s shiny new mod.
I wink to activate the NuView mod I won last year. It’s the only augment I have besides my legs, whereas Zach’s got an arm prosthesis—the nice kind, too, with a built-in Eel—on top of his augmented legs, plus an overclock mod somewhere inside his gut. I started competing the nanosec I was eligible, but it takes time to come up in the rosters. Not to mention training well enough to win. Zach outclasses me in mods, but it’s possible I could win on points. NuView is hard to demonstrate, but devastatingly clever if you do.
Best strategy is to go for the pin, regardless.
We’re still circling and eyeing each other. The NuView lets me see his pulse, but more importantly—he’s already charged his Eel. Which means any full-flesh contact with his arm mod and I’m going to be fried like last night’s dinner. But I’m not a complete idiot—I knew Zach was a likely top contender this month. So my all-body suit has a mod of its own—the soft, top-grade leather from the free rangers in Colorado has an added rubber lining. I stayed up half of last night to stitch it in, and it’s making me sweat like crazy, but it should provide some insulation. The true secret is in the thin metal wires sandwiched between—I’m trusting those to reroute the bulk of the Eel charge to my augments, where it’ll do less damage.
Zach finally makes the first move.
He leads with a jab, which I easily dodge, but I know it’s just a feint—like I expect, he follows it with a swipe of his leg against mine. I spin out of the knock, then dance away from him, hugging the edge of the ring. His best strategy is to take me down to the floor or bring me close in a grapple—that’s where he’ll win with the Eel, which is half electrified knife, half taser. Avoiding that is the whole fight for me… at least, until I’m ready for it. But first, I need to make him think I’m going for the pin the normal way.
I dance for a second or two, my back to the crowd. Their stares are hot on my neck, but the dose of Resilience helps me tune that out and focus on Zach’s light-footed steps. He’s shifting weight, scanning me, just like I’m raking his body with my gaze, looking for a tell while also using the NuView to find his overclock mod.
There it is.
Lower abdomen, deep in his core, but slightly closer to the front. Optimal position for cooling down his body temp by chilling his abdominal aorta. In my NuView, the artery it’s connected to pulses in his midsection like a beacon. The overclock mod’s also wired into his nervous system, and I can just make out the EM field that follows the circuit all the way up his spine. He has a failsafe trigger somewhere. I just have to find it. But I’m taking too long—gotta move first, set him up, buy some time for the scan.
I rock on my augments, back and forth, then dance forward until I’m just out of his strike range. I lead with a front kick—my foot to his right knee—but it’s just a feint as well. I use the momentum to spin a back-fisted glove to his face. He blocks, but I’m ready for that too, following with the other fist and landing this time square on his jaw. His head snaps back—I think as much in surprise as anything. He has to wonder why I’m bringing this to close-combat already. I dance back before he swings his Eel arm around to swipe at me. I’m back at the periphery of the ring, hopping foot to foot, watching him. Letting him think the flesh-on-flesh attack was a mistake.
He studies my stance for a few seconds, which is all the time I need to scan for the trigger—it’s at the top of his neck, behind his left ear. He probably has it code-protected, maybe a series of taps to active it, so he can’t be hacked. But I don’t think it will matter.
Zach makes a lunge toward me, and I expect him to lead with his modded arm, but instead he takes an augmented leap that has him sailing through the air, spin-kicking toward my head. He’s got to be aiming for my augments, but if he lands that kick… I rotate into him, arm blocking the Eel mod that’s suddenly in my face and jabbing an uppercut to his chin before I spin away. He lands hard on the ground, gouging the concrete and nearly skidding out of the ring. But he twists fast, facing me again, and this time the leg swipe takes me down.
I land on my back, air forced out of my lungs. Zach springs up with augment speed. He makes a run at me, but I get my legs in the air and jabber-kick at him, one-two-one-two, keeping him off balance while I dodge his Eel. I can’t breathe, but I can do without oxygen for a short stretch—the Resilience will carry me through. Zach lunges through an opening between my kicks, leading with his flesh hand, but the Eel’s not far behind. I whip my head to the side, just barely avoiding the punch, then follow it up with a dangerous roll that leaves my back exposed for a split second. He grabs for me, but my leather’s too slick, and he can’t get hold and goes down.
I get a foot under me and spring up again. He skitters away before I can take advantage of being up while he’s down. He’s back on his feet a quarter second later.
That was too close. Enough messing around. I know what I need to do now, I just need to get into the right position to execute.
We’re circling again. I need him to attack first, so he’s off guard. But I can’t just lead him into it. I jab a front kick to one leg—he blocks. Then the other—he spins a back kick that nearly takes me down. I stumble and recover, retreating to the edge of the ring. I dance there a moment.
My lungs start working again in one gasping breath. I flex my hands, rock a little on my augments, let him think I’m still pondering my next move. Then I slap my gloved hands together, sliding one against the other, and then charge toward him before he can notice that I’ve dislodged the tip of one finger of the glove. It takes me three steps to cross the ring. By the third, I’m sailing through the air, arms up for the grab. Just before I reach him, I make a knife with one hand and a claw with the other. He pulls back for a jab, but I get there too soon, and his punch doesn’t have any power. I let it whip my head to the side, because I already know where my hands have to go—one at his neck with a thumb behind his ear, the other plowed as deep into his gut as I can make it. I grapple hard and heave my legs up around his waist, locking them tight. His eyes fly wide as he stumbles backwards, my momentum forcing us, but that’s not what’s surprising him—it’s that I’m practically begging him to shock me with his arm.
And I am. Only now I’m too close, and I don’t want him to overthink this, so I ram the stiff fingers of my hand again and again into his gut. He cringes with the blows and tries to shove me off with his flesh hand—his augment arm is clamped at my waist—but he’s holding back, not shocking me.
Come on, Zach… I continue to pound his gut, keeping my other hand locked on the back of his neck, but that’s not what’s keeping me close. I squeeze my augmented legs tighter around his middle. There’s no way he’s getting me off without a zap from his Eel, which should send me flying. He tries to get a lock on my head, but the angle’s all wrong.
He snaps his teeth shut, and I know it’s coming—he’s preparing himself for the blowback. I manage to dig my hand deep into his gut just before the charge lets loose.
The pain lights up my brain, but the Resilience makes it feel like fireworks in the distance. My hand on his neck grips harder as we both convulse. The fall to
the concrete jars me loose, and the shock finally throws me clear.
I’m gasping for air, crawling on the ground away from him, just in case it hasn’t worked.
But it has.
I can tell by the wide-eyed look, the way he’s staring at the ceiling. And the fact that he’s not moving.
I scramble to my feet, hesitate for half a second, then slowly stroll over. He’s prone, limbs inert, lips tinged blue. I know he’s not dead, but the crowd’s holding their breath, telling me they’re not so sure. I rest my mechanical foot on top of one of his motionless legs, just to make the pin official.
The ref hustles to my side and raises my arm.
I won.
I hold back the smile, because it’s going to look far too creepy until everyone in the crowd realizes what’s happened. Zach’s support team swarms over him, and they quickly figure it out—he shorted out his own overclock mod. Under normal conditions, overclock is supposed to cool you down or warm you up from the inside out. If you’re overheated, it’ll chill that aortal bloodstream until your muscles rejuvenate like you’re some kind of Hercules on steroids. Alternatively, it can warm you up if you’ve fallen in a frozen river and are about to die of hypothermia. By routing Zach’s own Eel shock through my suit and straight to his gut with the open finger of my glove, I sent his overclock mod into reboot mode. Normally, that would just put him into a default check for emergency conditions. But simultaneously zapping his trigger point? That locked the overclock into cool-down. Basically, I used all his mods against him to send him spiraling into hypothermia on the floor of the ring.
Zach moans and sits up in the middle of his support team huddle.
The crowd cheers.
I let my grin loose and throw up my other hand in victory.
I hardly even notice the leftover tremors from the shock as I’m carried from the ring in a triumphant lap around the underground parking garage that serves as the Makers’ competition center. In less than an hour, the police bots will do their regular sweep through the heart of Old Portland, and everyone will have to clear out. Above ground, downtown looks like every other post-Singularity city in the world that hasn’t been taking over by the ascenders. In other words, a wasteland. If we want to keep the Makers’ far-flung network intact, we’ve got to keep up that appearance. The audience gathered for the competition will have to stay out of sight as much as possible when they return to their shops and homes and schools. They each have a vital contribution to give to the Maker’s bustling enterprise. We’re humanity’s one true hope for the future—the only chance to take the world back from the ascenders—and everyone’s role is important to that mission.
But for a few minutes—before we go back to the serious business of reclaiming the world and before I face what winning the Resurrection mod really means—I let them hold me up and parade me around the echoing underground cavern in celebration. It’s a small triumph, a tiny step toward the victory we’ll all be able to claim one day.
For real.
The crowd has dispersed, and I’m back in the prep room with the other jivs.
Most are already patched up, attended to by medics or wrapping each other’s bruised joints. I’m working on peeling off my leather suit, which I’m just now noticing is still smoking in some spots. Must have busted a few wires during the prior bouts and caused a bunch of internal shorts. Lucky I didn’t get burned. I give my exposed skin a careful look-over—the Resilience might not let me feel the scorching.
“What the hell’s in that thing?” Zach asks from the bench where he’s still huddled under his blanket. He’s not mad. I think.
“It’s not against regs,” I say. “And it’s not a foul to protect yourself.”
“Hey!” A set of fingers appear from beneath the blanket, up in surrender, then disappear back inside. “I’m not complaining, Mir. You won the mod, fair and square. I’m just wondering if you’ve become a maker or if someone else is crafting your gear now. I mean, that looks like something the shops would want a peek at.”
I scrunch up my face. “Well, it only kind of works.” Getting assigned to the shops isn’t on my agenda.
Zach snorted a laugh. “Like anything out of the shops works more than kind of.”
I shrug. “They do the best they can.”
“Show them the suit, Mir.” He trots out his big brother voice for that one.
I grin. “Yes, sir.”
He shakes his head, but there’s a smile under it. I guess I’m forgiven for winning.
I pick at the smoking remnants of my suit lining. There’s only so much the shops can do, reinventing everything from scratch. During the Singularity, most of humanity ascended into hyper-intelligent human/robot hybrids, and the ascenders basically took over the world. The few dissenters who didn’t like the idea of losing their souls in a quest for immortality had other things to do besides preserve the great knowledge stores of humanity—like staying alive during the religious purges that came after. It was a dark time, and a lot of knowledge was lost. Plus, the ascenders constructed special cities for their favored human pets, and they didn’t want them to get too curious about life before. Might make it difficult to keep them in their gilded cage. I should know—I was born legacy, and I get exactly how little the ascenders care about humans, even the ones they keep for their “genetic diversity.” I’m convinced the ascenders were happy to see the rest of humanity devolve into violent religious sects and anarchy.
But the Makers are different.
Someone in Old Portland managed to save the library. Somehow, by some miracle, they were able to squirrel away the paper books and electronic discs and all kinds of old-style maker-tech media, hiding all that pre-Singularity information in the Portland Underground. That dank network of tunnels along the waterfront used to be notorious for kidnapping sailors or something, but they were close enough to the water to keep the ascenders away… and they quickly became a sanctuary for the first post-Singularity knowledge-seekers and craftsmen and technologists. Those early Makers had to hide their treasure trove of information and quietly rebuild. But in the hundred years since, they’ve steadily grown. And they’re not just preserving pre-Singularity knowledge. They’ve scrabbled and tinkered and crafted their way to better and better technology… as well as a society to support it.
Even so, the tech is still sometimes pretty spotty. There are brilliant people in the shops, but the supply chain for goods is still underground, unreliable, and poor quality. Petroleum products from Wyoming. Rare earth metals from Idaho. Scavenged materials from the decaying city infrastructure around us. We smuggle some bot-made goods out of Seattle and outright steal tech from the ascenders to reverse engineer. Half the missions jivs train for are raids on New Portland, and we almost always lose someone to the police bots when we make a run. It’s necessary to keep the shops well-supplied, but no matter how much they innovate, they’ll never catch up to the ascenders. With their hyper intelligence and virtual immortality, they’re light years ahead… and always will be.
Unless something changes.
I’m determined to make something change.
I’m finally in civvies again, although I could use a good shower. Not that the whole prep room doesn’t stink of sweat and grease and slightly-singed rubber. I’m stowing my suit in my bag when someone charges through the door at my back. I don’t turn, because I’m pretty sure I know who it is.
“You. Are. Insane!”
Yup. Definitely directed at me, and very much the voice of Mateo, the shop apprentice who wants to be my second.
I turn to him, hiking my duffle over my shoulder. “If that’s your idea of a compliment, you need to up your game.” But I am a little relieved he wasn’t here to see the smoke coming off my suit. He’d just worry.
Mateo presses his lips together in that little disapproving face he makes whenever I do something normal for a jiv—like go on a mission or compete or get banged up in any way. He’s half cute and half annoying when he does it. Cut
e because… well, he’s always cute. Dark eyes, messy hair, and that soft brown skin from his Hispanic heritage. If I had time for a second, he’d be at the top of my list of candidates who are Definitely Hot Enough to Kiss. But he’s still annoying because he thinks, for some reason, that just because he’s concerned, that means I’m doing something I shouldn’t. But I know exactly what I’m doing. And I know Mateo’s going to hate what’s coming next even more.
He’s looking me over, like a medic checking for wounds. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” I brush past him toward the door. I’m not sleeping tonight anyway, due to the lingering Resilience, so I might as well cram in some extra studying. I’m going to need it.
He’s following me, which makes me smile a little. Once we’re out in the hall, away from the curious eyes and ears of the other jivs, he tags me on the elbow.
“Mir, hang on.”
I let him stop me in the dusty hall. My apartment with my dad is miles away, but there’s a transport waiting for the jivs. We’ve got some cloud cover today, so the normal satellites won’t be tracking us. Hard to say when the ascenders’ infrared sats will be watching, but a lone sun truck trundling around Old Portland shouldn’t draw too much scrutiny. But we’re not leaving until everyone’s ready to go, so there’s really no reason for me to rush off to the transport.
“Congratulations.” Mateo says it like he thinks he should, but he doesn’t really want to. Then he frowns. “You know they’re going to want you to test this mod, right?”
I huff a small laugh. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure that’s part of the terms and conditions, Teo.”
He shakes his head like he thinks I’m crazy again. “Why are you doing this? You know you’re going to give your dad a heart attack with this.”
The smile drops off my face. “He’ll be okay.” I don’t like talk of my dad hurting. My mom never made it out of Seattle—her heart disease was the kind the ascenders refused to cure, even though they could. But Mateo doesn’t know that. Most people don’t. The Makers just took me and my dad in after we left the legacy life behind and searched for somewhere else to call home.
Stories of Singularity #1-4 (Restore, Containment, Defiance, Augment) Page 10
