Girl of Flesh and Metal

by Alicia Ellis

  I had an appointment with Ron on Monday, so I only had to make it three more nights on the minutes of sleep I stole here and there. Without the coffee, I doubted I would still be awake by the time Marcy brought my food. It had been days since I’d had a good night’s sleep.

  Marcy gestured toward Owen. “Your mother says no bodyguards tonight. We’ll have a big crowd here soon, and security people are all over the place.” She turned and headed for the kitchen.

  I used the handrail to support my weight as I dragged my feet up the stairs. Owen followed close behind me, his arms raised as if he’d catch me if I couldn’t make it. When we reached the top, he offered an awkward bow and retreated back down the stairs.

  In the upstairs hallway, my dad’s voice drifted toward me from his office. His door stood a couple inches ajar. Although I didn’t understand the words at first, the tone was impossible to miss.

  He’d used the same one when he found out I skipped a day of school last year, and that time I was caught shoplifting back in middle school. A soft-but-firm voice that let me know his disappointment ran deep, and I would regret it if there were a repeat event. I preferred it when he shouted, which unfortunately, he almost never did.

  I hesitated at the door to my room, but curiosity won out against better judgment. I sneaked closer to his office door and stood just out of view of the interior, straining my ears to hear the discussion.

  “I definitely should not be eavesdropping,” I muttered to myself—but stayed put. “Or talking to myself.” Clearly, stress was getting the better of me.

  My father’s voice floated into the hallway, barely loud enough for me to overhear. “. . . security that has failed to secure the company’s premises. What do you expect me to tell the hundreds of elite customers who each paid tens of thousands for a Model One? We can’t secure our own lobby from vandals, and they’re supposed to trust our androids with all their vital details and tasks. If we have security concerns, our product is worthless. So what should I tell them?” He paused. My dad never asked rhetorical questions. He waited for an answer.

  I jumped when another person spoke. I’d assumed he was on the phone, but it looked like the object of his ire sat right there in the room.

  “We could tell them . . . our security team is doing everything in its power to ensure this will never happen again. We’ve doubled our men in the lobby and on the seventy-second floor.” His pitch rose at the end as if the statement were actually a question.

  “Oh, we’ve doubled our security,” my father said, his tone mocking. “You would like me to call our best customers—the ones who purchased our most expensive product, at full price, without waiting for the discount that will accompany later sales. You want me to tell them our security was lacking to begin with, so that now it must be doubled. Is that right? Perhaps the security of their Model Ones will be lacking as well.”

  “No,” the man said. His voice was little more than a whisper. It was the tone of prey—some poor beast searching for an escape route where none existed. Hoping that if he spoke quietly, perhaps my father would forget about him and find something else to do. No such luck.

  Guilt did somersaults in my gut. My dad was chewing out his employee because of what I did.

  My fingertips itched to push open the door and confess to the vandalism. That man could lose his job, and the worst I would get was being grounded forever. My parents wouldn’t let me go to jail.

  I reached for the door, but then froze.

  I imagined the lecture my dad would give me, and it would be even worse than this one. I wasn’t some random guy he’d hired to provide security. I was his flesh and blood. I should have been better. I was worse than a disappointment. I had shamed him.

  “You’re dismissed for now,” my father said.

  Before I could make up my mind, a large bald man flew through the doorway. He practically ran down the hall and didn’t even notice me pressed against the wall on the other side of the door. My father followed a moment later at a steadier pace, offering me a stiff smile as he passed.

  The room now stood wide open. It beckoned to me. I hadn’t expected an opportunity like this, but now that I had one, I had to take it.

  This was how I could figure out where Kevin lived, and if he was close enough for me to get from his place to mine in half an hour. There was no way I could have made it farther than three miles—probably two and half—without running full out. And if I’d run, I would have been exhausted when I woke at four-thirty.

  If Paul Rodriguez valued his privacy as much as other CyberCorp employees did, his address wouldn’t be listed publicly. But my father would have it.

  To convince myself of my innocence, I needed to know.

  I slipped inside the office and headed straight for the floor-to-ceiling window occupying the wall on my right. Right now, it displayed a wide green lawn, bounded on the far side with a row of privacy trees. I placed my right palm against the glass, and the surface went opaque black. Where I made contact, a small white square appeared with the words “Welcome, Lena Hayes.”

  I hoped my dad didn’t check access records on this vid-screen.

  A two-foot-wide rectangle in front of me filled with icons representing files and folders. I opened a file labeled Contacts and scanned the contents until I identified a row for Paul Rodriguez.

  I held my breath and touched the address to initiate the screen’s mapping application.

  The map filled the wall, so I had to step back several paces to take it all in. The red flag that marked 432 Nova Road stood near the green flag for my house, but I couldn’t tell how near. I pressed the flag, and the screen outlined a route from my house to his.

  Just under two miles.

  All the air rushed from the room, suffocating me. My mouth went hot. My stomach flipped and threatened to expel everything inside it. I swallowed hard to stop it.

  Kevin lived well within the range that would have allowed me to make it back home after murdering him.

  I couldn’t eliminate myself as a suspect, not by a long shot.

  18

  By nine that night, the solid wood of my bedroom door could only muffle the sounds of music and occasional uproarious laughter of the party downstairs. I played my own music loudly through the speakers built into my walls, and that helped a little.

  But it couldn’t drown out the possibilities.

  At this point, all I had was a suspicion. I had motive and opportunity, but that didn’t make me guilty.

  I couldn’t have done this. Right?

  I would have known if I’d killed someone. That was the sort of thing that changed a person, tainted the soul. My soul wasn’t tainted. Right?

  I popped another gummy candy, cranked up my music another notch, and moved faster to the beat.

  “Lena.” My mother skipped the part where she was supposed to knock and just barged in.

  “What’s up?” I shouted, without bothering to turn down my music.

  She said nothing until I touched the controls on my hand-screen to lower the volume.

  “Your father and I think you should come downstairs and mingle with your guests. It’s rude for you to stay up here.”

  “They’re not my guests.”

  Her lips pursed. “They’re our family’s guests, and whether you like it or not, you are part of this family.”

  I didn’t like it one little bit. “Fine.” I strode toward the door. I knew what I looked like right now, with my hair twisted back into a frizzy ponytail. I had traded the fitted jeans and blouse I wore earlier for sweatpants and a T-shirt almost as soon as I walked in the door this afternoon.

  She held up a hand to stop me. “Change first. Why don’t you wear that black dress with the sweetheart neckline? I’ve always loved that one.”

  “You’ve never said a word about that dress. Besides, it has short sleeves.” I stared down at my left arm. “You just want me to show this off.”

  “Lena, I need you with us on this. Three of our e
mployees have quit, and six more refuse to work on the Model Ones. They’re scared. They need to be reminded of how important our technology is, how much it helps people. It would do wonders for morale if they could see you looking confident and unafraid.”

  “And showing off the arm.”

  “Yes, that too. Could you try not to be so difficult?”

  “I didn’t realize not wanting to be your poster girl made me difficult.”

  She opened her lips just enough to let out a stream of air. “I’ll make you a deal. You put on a nice dress and come downstairs, and I’ll let you skip the next party we have.”

  “Why don’t you let me skip this one, and I’ll attend the next one?” By then, I would have skin covering my monstrosity of a limb.

  She offered stony silence in response. My mother was in a bind here. She needed me to come downstairs, or else she’d be embarrassed her daughter had played hooky and held her new cybernetic arm hostage at the same time.

  Heaven forbid my mother allow herself to look bad for any reason. Heaven forbid she put her kid’s needs ahead of her company.

  “I want a new car,” I said.

  “Excuse me?”

  “A new car. I’ve been riding with Lionel since I got back home, and I know he’s reporting my every move to you. I need space. I want to be able to drive myself.”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “Something without auto-drive.” I pointed at my arm. “That’s what got us into this mess in the first place.” We both knew that was an exaggeration, bordering on an outright lie. We’d gotten into this mess because of my reaction to the auto-drive. I’d been fumbling with the car’s controls instead of watching the road.

  But this wasn’t all on me. If my mother wasn’t so controlling, or if the damn auto-drive didn’t exist, none of this would have happened. She deserved a piece of the blame too.

  “Fine,” she said, her teeth gritted. She straightened her posture and gave me a wide, sweet smile. “I’ll see you downstairs in ten minutes.”

  Had I been in a better mood, I might have gotten dressed right away as instructed. Instead, I made a pit stop at Allie’s room. The door stood closed, which meant she was asleep. I swung it open and padded across the carpet to her toddler bed.

  Marcy had taken Allie’s braids out, and her hair formed a dark halo beneath her head. Her arms lay stretched away from her, one angled up, the other one down. Her mouth yawned open, and loud snores emanated from her tiny nose. I swallowed a laugh.

  Allie always swore up and down that she didn’t snore, but the noises this little person emitted in her sleep impressed me. Kind of like an elephant had climbed into her nose and was now trumpeting its arrival. My parents refused to admit it, but I suspected they wouldn’t let her sleep in the bed with them because she kept them awake all night.

  I sat in the window seat and watched her. So carefree and happy. Had I ever been like that? I couldn’t imagine getting back to that place. Not now. Everything had changed now.

  I reached down and touched Allie’s hair, soft beneath my fingertips.

  Her eyes opened, the snoring ceased, and she offered me a weak smile before falling back to sleep. The snores started anew, and louder this time.

  I tiptoed from the room and closed the door behind me.

  Feeling a little better—almost like I could face a room full of CyberCorp flunkies—I got dressed and fixed my hair. Five minutes after the deadline my mom gave me, I descended the stairs in a long-sleeved blue dress and matching satin gloves.

  As if on command, my mother met me at the bottom of the stairs. Her eyes narrowed for only an instant when she spotted my arm, completely covered by the dress and gloves. But she painted a smile on her face and led me around to meet her friends—which, apparently, was what we were calling her employees.

  They greeted me with fake grins and false laughter while I told them about my college plans—really, my parents’ college plans for me. All the while, their gazes could have bored a hole in my left glove.

  Something solid brushed against my back, and I turned, prepared to glare at the perpetrator. A silver Model One stood there, its head pointed to the side just far enough on its neck to look wrong.

  I let out a sharp squeal.

  The thing stood a few inches taller than me, its hand holding a tray of mini quiches. The android’s head rotated toward me, back to a human angle, and it shifted the tray in my direction, offering me a quiche. Its red eyes glowed down at me, eerily human despite their unnatural color.

  What was it thinking? Did it even think?

  “Lena, watch where you’re going.” My mother scolded me as my foot smashed down on hers. She caught my arm and righted me.

  I circled to her other side to escape the android. “You didn’t tell me there’d be a Model One here.”

  “The party is for them. Why wouldn’t they be here?”

  “They?”

  She gestured toward the kitchen door, where two more androids entered the room. Despite their metal bodies, they glided across the floor as if weightless.

  No one else at the party looked shocked to see them—as if machines each worth tens of thousands of bucks always spent their Fridays serving bite-sized eggy pies.

  My hands fisted at my sides. I could do this. It wasn’t like they were going to destroy humanity in one night. I could get through this party on my best behavior.

  As my mother wove us through the crowd to a new mingling target, she whispered to me, “The man I’ll introduce to you next is a promising new addition to the company.”

  I hated when she called CyberCorp the company—as if no other companies existed.

  “He graduated from MIT at sixteen, got his PhD two years later, then signed on with a small start-up making telecommunications equipment. At his last employment, he developed some of the hardware in your hand-screen and in that micro I bought you for your birthday.”

  She aimed me toward a man who looked barely older than me. With a shudder, I sidestepped another Model One along the way to him.

  Before we reached our target, my mother’s gaze flitted over to the swinging door separating the room from the kitchen. I followed her line of sight to find one of the catering staff waving her over, a panicked expression on his face.

  “Excuse me for a moment.” She spun on her heel and left me in the midst of her CyberCorp flunkies and androids. I would rather have been anywhere else in the world.

  Dr. Fisher slid into my path. More accurately, she wobbled into it on high heels that put her well over six feet. From her bloodshot eyes and the unraveling knot of blond hair, it looked like she’d had too much to drink. Way too much.

  “Lena!” It was the first genuine smile I’d ever seen from her. “How are you feeling?” She glanced down at my left arm.

  “I’m fine, thanks. Fully operational.” I shifted my weight from one foot to the other, then back again, while I searched for a mode of escape.

  Although I’d spent weeks in Dr. Fisher’s care, she’d left most of the talking to her assistants, Ron and Simon. When she was in the room, I always felt like I was wasting her time. But not tonight. Now, she seemed too excited to see me.

  It worried me.

  “You know, your mother is the one who pulled me off the Model Ones to work on your arm. I’ve been wanting to tell her something.” She slung one arm over my shoulder and leaned into it.

  I cringed under her considerable weight and ducked away before she took me down to the floor with her.

  Dr. Fisher wobbled again but stayed upright.

  She turned toward the kitchen, where my mother had disappeared a moment ago. She shouted in that direction. “I have a lot of resentment about being pulled off my life’s work to focus on a child’s arm!” Dr. Fisher turned back to me. “My therapist helped me see that. Resentment.” This time, when she said the word, spittle sprayed from her mouth and hit me in the forehead.

  If I couldn’t escape this conversation, perhaps I could us
e it to my advantage. Thanks to Kevin’s murder—on top of Harmony’s—I felt more determined than ever to find a killer who wasn’t me. Since it looked like Dr. Fisher was a chatty drunk, now was a good time to ask questions.

  “Who do you think killed Harmony Miller and Kevin Rodriguez?” I asked her.

  She made a noise that sounded like pfft. “When it was just the Miller girl, it could have been anyone.” She lowered her voice to a whisper that wasn’t nearly as quiet as it should have been. “He’s an asshole. It’s really too bad that killer went after his daughter—when he was right down the hall.” She let out a loud guffaw.

  I stepped back.

  Dr. Fisher grabbed the collar of my dress and pulled me back into her confidence. The stink of her alcohol-soaked breath wafted over me. “My son Mark worked for him. He applied just like anyone else—no nepotism. On his second day, right before Christmas, that jackass claimed Mark stole equipment from the lab. Fired him, ruined the boy’s life. He hasn’t been able to get a job since.” Bitterness and anger coated every word.

  So one of the men fired on Christmas Eve had been her son. Although I’d started questioning her to add others to my list of suspects, now I had no choice but to add Fisher herself to the list. “What about Paul Rodriguez. Do you hate him too?”

  “Everyone likes Paul. Always smiling, always positive.” The bitterness had not left her voice. “The man’s . . .” She wobbled on her feet.

  I held out an arm to catch her, but she righted herself and continued where she left off.

  “So cheery it makes you want to stick a fork in your eye—or in his eye.” She stabbed a finger at my chest, and for a second, I thought she would accuse me of the murders. “Be careful. Don’t end up dead. Then all my work on your arm would be even more of a waste.” She guffawed again, this time snorting along with it.

  Of course, she hadn’t been about to accuse me. My friends and I were the only ones who knew about the sleepwalking and how it lined up with the murders. I let out a relieved sigh.

  My mother returned in enough time to hear Fisher’s last few words. “Athena,” she hissed. “Control yourself.”