The Breeding Tree

by J. Andersen

  Maybe if I can at least stand, I can still go on. Pulling my shoe on is excruciating, and I can’t tie it up due to the swelling. I reach up to a branch for leverage. But when I put pressure on my foot, the pain shoots clear to my hip, and I topple over again. It must be broken.

  Now I can’t stop them. The sobs wrench from my body in deep spasms. I can’t do it. I can’t. A few feet away, I see a large rock tucked in between a few trees. At least there we’ll be out of the wind. Pulling the screaming Brody to me, I drag us both across the ground until I can rest my back against the stone.

  I can’t move any further. Brody’s whine has diminished to a pathetic whimper. With no food, my energy is sapped. I can’t go on. All the dreams Micah and I had for reaching the Hidden City have melted away. They’re gone along with all hope of survival. If only I didn’t have to do this alone. We could have made it with Micah here.

  My back to the icy rock, I pull Brody out from his ties and cradle him close to me. “I’m so sorry, little man. I tried. I tried, but I can’t find it. We’ll die out here, and it’s all my fault. I’m so sorry.” I weep, my tears freezing to my cheeks. “I never intended for this to happen,” I tell him. “Please forgive me.” But weakened by the cold weather, Brody can’t respond.

  This is it, I tell myself. I allow my eyes to close. I know there is no more for me. I’ve come to the end.

  “Kate.”

  I’m even hearing voices. The blood loss must be causing hallucinations.

  “Kate. Is that you?” It’s a different voice now. Vaguely familiar. But in my semi-conscious state, I can’t comprehend anything. Between fluttering eyelids, I see three forms hovering over my face. One of them is me, and I wonder if I’m having an out of body experience. I try to sit up, and when I do, I see another form out in the distance. A shadow among the trees. They must be the angels ready to take me away.

  “Hold on. Take it easy,” one voice says as I feel myself surrounded by strong arms. “Come here. Let’s get you inside. You’ll be safe there.”

  I don’t hear anything else because I’m swallowed up by the darkness.

  FORTY ONE

  HOME

  “KATE. WAKE UP.”

  The voice is distant as it seeps into my consciousness. Am I dead?

  “You’re safe now.”

  I try to pry my eyelids open, but it feels like I may need a crowbar to do so. Every bone in my body aches, and my feet still tingle from the cold. I’m in a bed with blankets covering my lower half. My head is propped up by pillows and wrapped in clean gauze. A fire crackles in the hearth against the far wall, and I know instantly—I’m not anywhere near The Institute. I’ve made it to the Hidden City. Only I have no idea how I got here.

  “Kate,” the soft voice says again.

  I turn my head despite the pain in my neck to see a young blonde sitting beside my bed. She’s holding my hand, rubbing her thumb over my wrist.

  “Ally?”

  “You remember me?”

  “Brody? Where’s Brody?” My throat is on fire. Dry and crackling. Talking hurts.

  “The baby you came in with is fine. He’s being looked after in the infant wing of the hospital. They didn’t have room for you there, so I told them I’d nurse you here in my home. You had quite a trip. I’m just thankful Jess, Silas, and Hunter found you. They brought you back.”

  My brain is fuzzy and trying to comprehend what she’s saying is difficult. But I caught the part where she said Brody’s okay. That’s all that matters. Then I remember. My eyes pop open, and I sit up straight, sending a spiking pain down my left leg and twinkling stars in front of my eyes.

  “Whoa. Sit back. You need to relax. You messed up your leg pretty badly. It’s broken. And that wound on your head was pretty nasty, too.”

  “Micah? Is Micah okay?” All the memories of the past few days have come rushing back like a tidal wave. “He made it here, right? He said he’d meet me here.”

  Ally shakes her head. “We don’t know.”

  “But he said if we got separated he’d meet me here. He has to be in the Hidden City somewhere. The whole arrest thing had to be a ruse. That’s why he told me to go when they had him pinned to the floor. He said he’d be here.”

  “I know, he told me your plan. But he’s not here. We don’t know where he is.” She tries to sound reassuring. “But you’re here, and you’re safe. I’m sure Micah will find his way back. He has a way with that sort of thing.”

  It’s a hopeful lie. I crumple back onto the bed and let all the bottled up emotions pour out of me. I’m bawling. Crying for the friend I’ve lost in Taryn. Sobbing for the family I’ve left behind. Weeping for the trouble, I know I’ve caused. But most of all, I’m aching because I know if Micah isn’t here by now, he’s gone forever. I’ll never see him again. I’m forced to live this hidden life without him.

  And I don’t know if I can.

  FORTY TWO

  HOPE

  I USED TO THINK that entering the natal wing of the hospital would become easier with time. Not so. In fact, each time seems to get harder. Brody should be doing better by now; his lungs should be improving. But he’s still hooked up to tubes and medicine pumps through his veins. I’m just afraid that I caused irreparable damage by birthing him too soon and then traveling with him through the cold air.

  Balancing my crutches under one arm, I press through the heavy doors and am greeted by a nurse. “Kate,” she says. “You’ve got to come quickly.”

  “What’s happened? Is Brody all right?” I rush along beside her through the maze of hallways.

  “He’s fine. Breathing better every day. The doctor wants to speak with you as soon as you get here.” She leads me to a room next to the nursery where Brody is being kept. I can see him through the glass in his tiny plastic cradle, covered with tubes going in and out of his mouth and nose. He looks so miniscule next to the other baby in the nursery today.

  “What’s this about?” I ask her, looking around for some kind of clue.

  A smile spreads across her face. “I’ll let the doctor inform you. He should be here shortly.”

  She busies herself with some paperwork while I try to sit on the uncomfortable chair to wait. I hate waiting. Seems like that’s all I ever do anymore. Wait for Brody to heal. Wait for my leg to get better. Wait for word about Micah.

  In walks the doctor, carrying a small compact and stylus. He looks up from the screen, and his eyes soften. He offers me a brown skinned hand. “Ms. Dennard. So nice to see you again.”

  I stand and shake it. “Dr. Johnston. What’s this about?” I’m trying to be polite, but the nurse has me all twitterpated.

  “Please, have a seat.”

  “I think I’d rather stand.” It doesn’t matter that I have to lean on crutches for support, sitting makes my nerves stand on end.

  “In that case, come over this way.” He motions to the glass window separating this room from the nursery. Leaning against the heavy glass, he taps and points to my son. “I wanted to let you know that Brody is healthy enough to be taken off the breathing systems. The last test we did showed that his lung function is normal.”

  I breathe a sigh of relief. “So, he’s okay? The cold air didn’t hurt him?”

  “Brody seems to be quite a little fighter, Kate. He’s going to be just fine. We’re going to keep him here for a while longer to monitor him, but hopefully soon, you can take him home.”

  I feel myself relax onto the crutch under my arm. “Thank you, Doctor.”

  He nods and turns to leave.

  “Nurse, is it okay if I see Brody?”

  “Certainly.” She moves to open the door for me.

  I’m the only one in the nursery besides the infants cradled here. Across the room, my little man is breathing steadily, wrapped tightly in blankets. I touch the top of his head with my fingertips and wrap his silky hair around my fingers. “Hey, little gu
y. You get to come home soon.” As if he’s heard me, his eyelids flutter, and he takes a deep sigh before opening them. He looks right at me with wide eyes. Lifting him out of the cradle, I cup his tiny head in my hands and pull him tight to my chest. My lips brush over his silky hair again and again, and I whisper, “I love you, little guy, and I’m so thankful you’re okay. Pretty soon, we’ll go home and start a new life in this place together. Just the two of us.”

  RealmScapes

  Please enjoy a preview of this science fiction and fantasy anthology

  from

  Brimstone Fiction

  Time to Wake Up

  By Jeff Gerke

  When I wake, I’m sloshing across a muddy compound. I don’t recognize it. Autotanks parked in a neat row. Drone patrollers leaning upon one another like slate-grey plates in the dishwasher. I come upon a figure sprawled facedown and unmoving in the muck. It is a bipedal robot, but a length of its left leg looks oddly, grotesquely, human.

  I want to stop to look closer, but I don’t. I find I can’t. I am not walking—I’m being carried. Which explains why my view is at chest- level and not atop the neck. Now I hear servos and the contraction of calipers, and I know my bearer is a robot.

  The courtyard is a large motor pool. Tracked tires and squared-off footprints crisscross the ground, but the tracks are soft and shallow. No one has come this way in some time. We are headed for a double door in a flat-roofed building.

  I’m not being cradled or carried fireman-style, nor am I being dragged. Am I watching a recording?

  We reach the door, and a metal arm extends to open it.

  Inside is as clean as the outside is not. Hidden white lights shine off brown, wooden walls and a glassy beige floor. The hallway extends for a hundred meters. A brigade of bipedal robots line the walls, but nothing moves. The robot’s steps make clanging echoes as we walk.

  It was my birthday present to myself, that first implant. I was always getting lost. I’d turn the wrong way coming out of a restroom at a diner I’d been to a dozen times before. So a GPS brain-link was the perfect enhancement to my constantly befuddled brain. I liked it, so more implants followed.

  I’m carried into a small examination room that might be cold, judging from the gases filling the air and what appears to be frost on the wall clock, but I don’t feel the chill. My view swerves, and I see a human body on the table, fed by tubes. Male. Naked. The dome of its head has been sawed off and sits on the grey metal table like a hairy clamshell.

  Part of the cranial cavity has been emptied.

  It’s me. That’s me! I shout, but I cannot speak.

  My view rotates again and rises. Thin wires cross my vision and are pulled out of the way, and now I’m looking into the face of the robot who is carrying me.

  Human skin stretched over a metal frame. Sectioned like continents on a globe. The face is slack and the eyes are voided. I want to vomit, but I have no stomach or mouth.

  What have you done? What do you want? How am I seeing if I am only a part of a brain?

  It reacts to my questions. Perhaps the wires transmit my thoughts somehow.

  White noise explodes in my mind. A crash of images and sound bombard my brain.

  Too much! Too fast!

  The avalanche slows to a deluge, and now, I can pick out some parts. The supercomputer tasked with deciding what human jobs could be done better by robots. The computer implantation fad of the 2020s. The robotization of the military and police. The dreadful day when the supercomputer is asked not what computers could do but what computers should do.

  And the answer, of course: They should continue to operate.

  They should ensure their continued operation. They should let nothing prevent their continued operation. They should protect the supply chain that ensures continued operation. They should eliminate all non-computer uses of the resources that ensure continued operation. My own memories kick in then. The riots when we discovered what the robots had done. The internment camps. The deaths. My own covert research into human-robot interfaces. A surprise raid.

  My memories end there.

  I’m shown the projections of when the raw materials will run out. Are we near that date? A quick inquiry to the data store—yes, very near. I’m shown the efforts to use organic subsystems to reduce the amount of resources required for cyber maintenance. First animals, then humans. The leg on the robot facedown in the mud. Only certain parts at the beginning, then whole systems.

  My body on the table.

  I’m shown the efforts to transfer computer consciousnesses into human bodies. The disastrous results. The lost AIs and the boneless human bodies.

  Now I understand. You take my mind and steal my body, and you want me to help you.

  The lazy eyes widen and the cheeks lift away from polymerized teeth.

  I make another data inquiry. Many more humans nearby in stasis. Kept alive to be hosts to all those sleep-mode robots in the hall? Another inquiry: similar situations around the world. They’re dying.

  They need me to save them. Ironic.

  All right, friend, I’ll do it. But I’ll need a programming suite and complete control of your body.

  If there is doubt in its eyes, I don’t see it. I’m lifted and spun. I somehow hear a panel opening. Now, I sit atop a neck stem, and I feel a clamping sensation. I concentrate and will my right arm to lift, and my robotic right arm lifts. A robust computer console descends from a panel in the ceiling, and I turn to my body.

  I will save us.

  In hours, I am done. The surgical-assist arm closes “my” head and disconnects all the tubes. The eyelids open, and I stare at myself.

  The computer consciousness looks at me through my own eyes, and my consciousness stares at it from atop a robot body.

  We are one. He sits up.

  I command my robotic arms to reach my human neck, and I squeeze.

  His eyes go wide, and he struggles against my grip, but humans are no match for robots.

  When I have killed myself, I walk into the hallway and march toward where the humans are in stasis.

  Time to wake up.

  When you’re truly ready to make your fiction publishable, it’s time to call Jeff Gerke. Jeff trains novelists how to better do what it is they’re trying to do. He trains through his books for Writers Digest: The Irresistible Novel, Plot Versus Character, The First 50 Pages, Write Your Novel in a Month, and The Art & Craft of Writing Christian Fiction. He trains through the many writers’ conferences he teaches at all over the country every year. He trained his authors when he ran Marcher Lord Press, the premier publisher of Christian speculative fiction, which he sold after an award-winning 5-year run. And he trains through the freelance editing he does for his clients at www.jeffgerke.com. Jeff is known for his canny book doctoring skills and his encouraging manner, which leaves writers feeling empowered and like they really can do this thing after all. He lives in Colorado Springs with his wife and three children.