Girl of Flesh and Metal

by Alicia Ellis

  Thankfully, she didn’t question me when I raced past the guest bathroom and up the stairs. Allie’s door stood closed, which meant she was probably napping. I opened it and slipped inside.

  Cocooned in pastel-pink blankets, my sister lay in her bed. Through the window, the sun cut a stripe of light across the darkened room and across Allie. Her face was turned toward the window, as if to soak up every ray. Her lips were parted in an unconscious half smile, and with each breath, her chest rose and fell. And of course, she was snoring loudly enough to rouse a hibernating bear.

  I didn’t want to wake her, and more than that, I didn’t trust myself to touch her after last night. It was better that she was asleep, and I didn’t have to explain any of this to her.

  I slid to the floor and hugged my knees, my back against the inside of the door. Allie’s snoring calmed me. Comfortable, predictable, safe. I closed my eyes and willed myself to relax. For a second—less than a second—it worked.

  Then I slipped into silent sobs that quaked through my body.

  I must have cried myself to sleep because when I opened my eyes again, the light in the room had shifted. I needed to get back downstairs before my mother sent the troops for me. After rubbing the sleep from my eyes, I pushed off the floor and to my feet.

  My fingers left a streak of red on the carpet. I stooped and examined it. Dark and wet. Was that blood? I leaned closer and inhaled the earthy, acrid scent of it.

  Definitely blood. Allie’s?

  Panic ripped through my gut, leaving a sickening, empty feeling in its wake.

  The sun no longer fell across Allie’s face. In the darkened room, I couldn’t tell whether she was smiling anymore, whether she was moving, whether she was breathing. And for the first time, I realized she wasn’t snoring.

  With my heart pounding in triple time, I ran to Allie’s bed. Maybe—maybe—I could live with having killed three of my classmates. Although it would shatter my soul every day to think of it, I might survive.

  But if I had hurt Allie . . . if I had hurt my sister, I couldn’t live with that. I would not wake up every day for the rest of my life to a world where my sister didn’t exist.

  I’d rather not wake up at all.

  Was this Debbie’s justice? A life for a life. I had taken hers, and my sister would pay the price? I deserved no better, but Allie was innocent.

  Not my sister. Anything else. Anyone else.

  The trip to Allie’s side took infinite time in only an instant. During it, nothing existed except the terror of what I would find.

  I’d barely touched her when she sat bolt upright in bed and shoved me away. “What? Stop shaking me.”

  A dam broke inside me again. Tears flooded over my cheeks, and I did nothing to stop them.

  Allie leaped to her feet on her bed, face level with mine. “Don’t cry. Why? Don’t cry.” She petted my cheeks.

  My emotions were bigger than me. I could no longer fit them inside. I’d killed three people, but Allie was okay. Allie was fine. And still, I’d killed three people. “You weren’t snoring.” Tears continued to drown my cheeks, unchecked.

  “I woke up.” After a pause, she added, “I don’t snore.” She pointed at my forehead. “Bleeding.”

  I touched my face where she’d pointed, and my fingertips came away red. One of my stitches had popped. Allie was not bleeding. I was.

  I lifted her off the bed and cradled her against my body, burying my face in her hair. She smelled of strawberry-scented conditioner. I breathed deeply and tried to memorize the smell, memorize the sensation of her hair against my skin, memorize the feel of her in my arms.

  Perhaps sensing that I was too overwhelmed to explain it to her, Allie said nothing, just allowed herself to be pressed against me. Eventually, I set her back in her bed. She stared up at me with solemn, huge brown eyes. I kissed her on the forehead and left the room.

  Although I hadn’t hurt Allie, I could no longer trust myself around her. And that meant I couldn’t stay here. I had to leave.

  In my bedroom, I cleaned the blood from my hands and face. Then I unzipped my school bag, turned it upside down, and shook it until all my books, papers, and pencils tumbled onto the floor. In the empty bag, I stuffed a change of clothes and my pain medication.

  I shouldered the bag and headed to the stairs that would lead me back to the foyer. Careful not to make any noise, I tiptoed down the steps. Somehow, my mother heard me anyway.

  “Lena, would you come back in here please? They have a few more questions.”

  If this morning’s questioning had been any indication, her definition of few would be somewhere around a thousand. I scanned the foyer for a place to stuff my backpack until I could make an escape. Finding none, I ran back upstairs, tossed it in my room, and arrived back downstairs out of breath.

  I’d set one foot into the living room, when the doorbell rang. I turned toward the door, but my mother’s glare pinned me in place. She pointed to the chair I’d occupied earlier. Head down, I dragged myself to the seat.

  The doorbell rang a second time. Marcy hurried from the kitchen and then out of my view as she entered the foyer. A moment later, she led Detectives Garrett and Johnson into the room.

  My mother leaped to her feet and ran across the room toward the cops. Her tall heels skimmed over the hardwood floor. She stopped in front of the detectives and blocked them from the rest of the room.

  “I believe we’ve given you enough of our time today,” she said. “Lena will come to the station to make a statement when we’re ready. Until then, we have nothing more to add.”

  “That’s fine.” Detective Johnson dangled a pair of handcuffs, and my chest constricted. “Because she has the right to remain silent.” He sidestepped my mother and addressed his next words to me. “You’re under arrest for the murders of Harmony Miller, Kevin Rodriguez, and Deborah Carlyle. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you . . .”

  Johnson grabbed my left wrist and twisted it behind my back, just as I’d done to Harmony. He was still listing my rights, but it all fell to the background, like white noise. My heart rate quickened, and the sound of my pulse rushed past my ears. The pain in my head swelled.

  My left forearm jerked loose and came down hard on Johnson’s wrist. Metal slapped flesh and bone, and his shriek rang out through the room. He clutched his injured wrist in his other hand, his face twisted in agony.

  Garrett reached for her sidearm, but I was already in motion toward her. My left arm grabbed her wrist and snapped it to the side. She shouted and went down.

  Screaming filled my ears, and I turned toward it. My mother’s mouth hung open mid-wail.

  My father’s lips moved, making a word over and over again, but I couldn’t hear it through my mother’s screams and the wail inside my head. From the shape of his mouth, it looked like my name.

  Johnson managed to wrestle his sidearm from its holster and pointed it at me. Before he could fire, my mother jumped between us, palms stretched out toward him.

  Johnson cursed and lowered his weapon.

  I darted from the room.

  “Move!” he shouted.

  Behind me, my mother grunted, followed by a loud thud as something large hit the floor. A gunshot cut through all other sounds, like a canon.

  “Lena, run!” my dad yelled after me.

  Footsteps pounded behind me, but I didn’t turn to look. The front door stood up ahead, but the detectives were too close. If they shot now, I’d be dead.

  I veered to the left and into the kitchen. Something crashed to the floor as the detectives scrambled behind me. I reached the door to the outside, flung it open, and darted into the chilly winter air.

  Detective Johnson caught up with me before I got my car door open. For the first time since I’d gotten the gorgeous vehicle, I regretted having to use a key to open it.

  He grabbed my right arm. I twisted to face him, ducked low, and slammed the heel of my metal palm in
to his shin. He cursed as he fell to the ground, and I was in the car before Garrett reached us.

  I had no idea where I was going.

  A tiny voice in my head screamed at me to stop, to surrender. But it was too late. I had injured two detectives. If they’d had any doubt of my guilt before now, it had disappeared.

  30

  I pulled out of the driveway and barreled through the neighborhood at seventy miles per hour. My tires squealed around each corner.

  One of my neighbors had a driveway that circled to the back of their house. I slowed enough to pull into it and out of view of the street. Less than thirty seconds later, a police siren blared past.

  I hadn’t intended to run. But my arm had already slammed Johnson’s wrist before I realized I was resisting. Now, I had two choices: turn myself in, or figure out whether my AI had somehow caused my actions. If I turned myself in now, I might never know the whole truth.

  I needed the truth for Debbie—and for myself.

  After waiting another thirty seconds, I pulled back onto the street and navigated through the neighborhood to a main road. I considered slowing to a more reasonable speed, but decided against it.

  My new car made a terrible getaway vehicle. Not only was it cherry red and required a key for entry, but it also looked like an antique next to the sleeker vehicles alongside me. I needed to get off the road.

  The one thing I had going for me was that, unlike the newer vehicles, mine was made before the safety law requiring that all electric engines make artificial noise. The car coasted along the road in complete silence.

  “Message Liv,” I told my hand-screen, which had automatically connected to the car’s audio system.

  “Messaging Liv,” it responded through the car speakers. “Speak your message.”

  “I’m in trouble. Meet me at McCauley Park. I need you.”

  The hand-screen beeped to confirm. A few seconds later, I received a reply from Liv, who confirmed she was on her way.

  I arrived at the park and stopped in a parking space between two family-sized vehicles. If I got lucky, any police car speeding past the park’s entrance wouldn’t be able to see my compact car between the two much larger vehicles, despite how conspicuous my red beast of a vehicle was.

  Just to be safe, though, I got out and sat behind a tree about a hundred feet from the lot.

  While I waited, my hand-screen buzzed. I almost sent the call to voicemail. But if I did that, I would have been here alone with my thoughts of Debbie—staring at me, gaping at me. I almost dropped the device as I fumbled to accept the call.

  “Hello.”

  “Miss Hayes, I’m sorry to bother you.” It still felt surreal to hear Philip Pollock’s voice directed at me after years of listening to his audio programs.

  “No. It’s no problem at all.”

  “Actually, there is a problem. It’s my understanding you called the police to report my brother’s so-called confession. And according to the camera footage of my private home, you did so after trespassing on my property.”

  I didn’t know how to respond to that, so I said nothing.

  “As you know, my family enjoys a high level of respect in the community. It’s not my intention to discourage you from reporting crimes in general, but in this case, I feel your doing so was . . . imprudent. As I told you, our security system is flawless.”

  “Look,” I said. “I’m sorry about that. I thought it was a confession, and I ran with it—because what innocent man approves of murder?”

  “A man who refuses to take his medication unless he’s physically restrained. A man who was moved by your implication that the murders would garner public attention for an anti-technology point of view.”

  “But he’s always ranting about how the ungodly can’t be allowed to live, and about how the spawn of CyberCorp have to die. He came to my house and tried to kill me!”

  “The ungodly and the spawn are not children, Miss Hayes. They’re the Model Ones. Those emotionless androids are CyberCorp’s spawn, and they were at your house on the day my brother showed up.”

  My mouth dropped open. That was why Adam hadn’t killed me when I was on the ground that night. He hadn’t been after me at all. Shame coursed through my gut. I could add Adam Pollock to the growing list of people I had wronged.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I shouldn’t have shown up at your house like that.”

  “That’s one thing we can agree on. Do not contact me or my brother again.” The call ended.

  I closed the hand-screen too hard and the metal bent in my left hand. I silently cursed at myself. I’d been so determined to find an alternate suspect that I’d convinced a sick man to support murder. Two months ago, I would have called myself a good person, but now, each moment that passed made me less and less sure of that.

  The first bit of luck I’d gotten in months showed up when Liv pulled into the parking lot a moment later. My bent hand-screen buzzed in my lap. Luckily, I could still read the caller ID. It was Liv.

  I jogged over to her. She touched her ear as I approached, ending the call. She climbed back into the driver’s seat, and I jumped in on the passenger side.

  “What’s going on?” she asked.

  “Drive—anywhere. I want to get as far away from my car as possible.” I wanted to get as far away from my life as possible, but far away from my car would have to do for now.

  She gave me a questioning look but started the engine anyway. “You got it.”

  Except for occasional concerned glances, Liv left me in peace for the next ten minutes while she drove around town. I spent the time trying to push Debbie’s face from my head, and trying to decide how much to tell Liv.

  She was bound to hear it eventually, now that a warrant had been issued for my arrest. The least I could do was let her hear it from me. Still, I was in no hurry to do the deed, so I stalled. I stared out the window and pretended not to see Liv’s curious glances.

  My hand-screen buzzed, and I checked the display. Two messages. Another message from Jackson. I couldn’t deal with him right now. I had a more urgent crisis.

  I also had an older message from my mother. It had arrived a few minutes ago, but I must not have heard it come in. “Call me,” the message said. “Let us handle this.”

  My fingers hovered over the screen. I wanted to thank my mom for the way she’d stood between me and a bullet. But if I called her now, she would take back control of the situation, and so far, that had gotten me nowhere good.

  I deleted both messages and stuffed the hand-screen back in my pocket.

  “The police are calling me.” Liv gestured toward her ear, where she wore her micro-comm. She gave me a pointed look and accepted the call. “Hello.” Her eyes narrowed as she listened to whatever was being said. “No, I haven’t seen her. Lena would never . . .” She stole a glance at me. “Sorry. I don’t know where she is. I’ll let you know if I hear from her.”

  She touched her ear to end the call.

  “What did they say?”

  “I assume you know you’re wanted for the murders?”

  I stared down at my hands, which lay twisted together in my lap.

  “What the hell is going on? You’re not some killer who picks innocent victims to make a point.”

  Except maybe I was.

  “You should turn yourself in. They can’t prove you did this because you didn’t.”

  I opened my mouth to tell Liv everything. She’d stuck by me through tough times lately, and I owed her the truth. “Liv, I . . .” She wouldn’t turn me in. And maybe that was the problem. She could be charged with accessory after the fact or obstruction of justice—or something—for keeping her mouth shut. If I told her the truth, she would be guilty of helping someone she knew was a murderer. “I can’t stay with you,” I said instead.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “They’re going to look for me with you. At your house, wherever you go. They can track you.” I pointed to the wrist th
at held her ID chip. “They’re going to assume I’m with you, and they’ll find me. And if they find me before I figure this out, I’ll always think that I . . .”

  Debbie’s face squeezed its way back into my thoughts. Pale skin, wide eyes, open mouth.

  “I need a little more time,” I finished. “That’s all.”

  “What about Hunter? You met him only a few weeks ago. They won’t expect you to be with him.”

  “Fine,” I said. “I guess we have a plan.”

  31

  As if in a spy movie, Liv took a long route to Hunter’s house. Along the way, she glanced in her rearview mirror almost every minute to make sure no one was following. Despite the somber situation, I almost laughed when she stopped for a yellow light, and then raced through the intersection when it turned red.

  “What?” Her jaw stayed locked with firm concentration. “If someone was following us, I wanted them to get stuck at the light.”

  “Why would anyone follow us?”

  “Because . . . Okay, I guess if the police found us, they’d just arrest you.” Her face broke into an embarrassed smile. “Give me a break. My life’s never this exciting.”

  My mood went solemn again. “And let’s hope it never is again.”

  Liv continued checking her mirrors, but at least she dispensed with the spy tactics.

  A few minutes later, Hunter met me at his front door, waved to Liv, and ushered me up to his room.

  His bedroom was exactly what I would have expected. Shades of blue and yellow filled the room. Yellow pillows topped a blue bedspread. In one corner, a wooden desk had been painted cobalt and gold in what I guessed, from the dried paint droplets, had been a do-it-yourself project. The carpet held rows and rows of a concentric-squares pattern in numerous shades of blue.

  Just like Hunter, the room was full of life and hope, with just a touch of not giving a damn. The best thing about it was that it smelled like him, a mix of mint and springtime soap. I wanted to curl into a ball, forget everything outside these walls, and stay here forever.