Tattoo Atlas

by Tim Floreen

  Instead he stuck a finger in my face and snarled, “You fucking told Callie. About the steam tunnels. About what you and I did last night. That’s why she was so pissed in the car.”

  I shook my head while I struggled for breath to speak. “She hasn’t told anyone, Tor. And she won’t. We can trust her. Please don’t be mad. I’ve just been feeling really confused about everything that’s been happening, and I needed to talk to someone about it.”

  “You had no fucking right to tell her, Rem. That stuff we did, it’s private.” He leaned in until our noses almost touched, and his eyes looked straight into mine like they never did down in the steam tunnels. In a weird way, this felt more intimate than anything we’d ever done down there.

  “I’m sorry,” I stammered. “I’m telling you, it’s okay.”

  “It better be.” He banged me against the door one more time and turned on his heel. “Otherwise you’ll both regret it,” he muttered before disappearing around the corner.

  “This is Franklin Kettle’s brain immediately prior to the procedure.”

  Mom had brought up the black-and-white image on the huge flat-screen fixed to the wall in the main lab. It showed a human head in profile, with the brain coiled inside the skull like a clump of those extra-thick Japanese noodles. Everything looked normal enough, at least to a nonscientist like me. Except I did notice a few white dots, very small, located in various places among the doughy coils. “What are those spots?”

  “They’re cerebral nanodrones. The day Franklin arrived here, we injected them into his brain through his nose, and they navigated to sites we suspected were underperforming. The drones monitored Franklin’s neuronal activity at those sites, and we used the data to help us configure the capsule.”

  “Those are nanodrones? You told me about them. I didn’t know you were already using them on actual people.”

  Her eyes shunted away from mine in a weird way. “We just started. Franklin’s our first subject.”

  She punched a few keys on the keyboard in front of her, and the image began to move. A drill appeared—disturbingly similar to the kind we had hanging on the wall in the garage at home—and positioned itself against the back of Franklin’s skull. A jolt, and the drill started to bore through bone. I winced and turned my head a little to one side but didn’t look away.

  Dr. Hult chuckled. I hadn’t heard him come in. He stood near the door with his arms crossed and his comb-over draping across his head in thick, greasy tendrils. “At least it gives you a sense of how hard the human head really is.”

  “I’m fast-forwarding through the footage of the operation now,” Mom said.

  The video sped up. The drill withdrew and the capsule appeared, smooth, egg-shaped, and about the size of an acorn, held by a delicate pair of forceps. The capsule slid through the hole in Franklin’s skull and nestled at the back of his brain.

  “Now watch this.”

  From the pointed end of the egg, around a dozen slender threads deployed, snaking their way through Franklin’s cerebral matter. The sight was oddly beautiful, like a time-lapse video of a growing plant, or the undulating tentacles of a squid. Eventually the end of each thread settled near one of the nanodrones.

  “They’re specially designed electrodes,” Mom said. “We have thirteen of them positioned at various sites, mostly in the amygdala and orbitofrontal cortex. They send out tiny energy pulsations that target specific neurons and stimulate them to function like they’re supposed to.”

  Dr. Hult wagged his finger at the screen. “That’s a very sophisticated piece of equipment we’ve put inside Mr. Kettle’s head, constantly tracking his brain activity and adjusting itself accordingly. It’s connected to our wireless network too, so we’re able to monitor and control it at all times.”

  “What about the nanodrones? What happened to them?”

  “Watch,” Mom answered.

  The tiny white dots began to move, all of them flowing toward the place where the scientists had inserted the capsule.

  “We extracted them through the burr hole at the end of the procedure.”

  I sat back in my chair and folded my arms across my chest. “I still don’t understand how you’re going to know, really know, if the capsule’s working, though. This isn’t like fixing a broken bone, where you can just glance at an X-ray and see if it’s healing. With mental stuff, it’s a lot harder to tell, isn’t it? What if the capsule doesn’t work, but Franklin decides to . . .”

  “Fake it?” Dr. Hult asked, his face splitting into a grin.

  “Exactly. If he’s still a sociopath, he might enjoy screwing with you like that, right? And would it really be that hard to do? You said yourself, Mom, he’s a smart guy.”

  “It’s certainly possible.” Mom grabbed her mug of coffee. “That’s why we’re administering a wide range of tests and watching him carefully. If nothing else, he’s become more cooperative since the procedure, which is making testing easier. We’re measuring his heart rate, pupil dilation, other involuntary responses that are almost impossible to fake. He could try to put one over on us, but I’m confident something would give him away eventually.” Mom’s phone chimed. She glanced at it and said, “They’re ready to bring him up. Now listen, Rem: I already told you I don’t think he’ll behave like he did last time, but I still need you to keep the conversation as neutral as you can.”

  “I tried before,” I said, “but he didn’t want to talk about art.”

  “So talk about the weather. You can’t go wrong with the weather, right? We’ll limit the conversation to five minutes, just like before. It’ll be over before you know it.”

  I nodded. “Five minutes.”

  “You’re sure you want to do this?”

  “Absolutely.”

  And I meant it. I couldn’t have told her why, I didn’t even know if I understood the reason myself, but I wanted to see Franklin again.

  Mom kissed me on the cheek, and a few seconds later I found myself sitting at the big white table again.

  When Franklin came in and slouched over to the chair in front of the window, his appearance took me by surprise, but not in the way I’d expected. I’d been all ready to search his face for some sign that the procedure had transformed him, but instead, the second I set eyes on him, I thought, Holy shit, Callie was right. Now that his hair had disappeared, I could actually see his face, and it was definitely striking. Not handsome in Tor’s conventional, Nordic god sort of way. But intriguing, sculptural, with jutting cheekbones and a nose that zigzagged like a twisty mountain range. He must’ve broken it at some point, but I didn’t know when or how. The look suited him, though. I wondered what he’d look like if he also got rid of the glasses.

  I squirmed in my chair. Catching myself thinking thoughts like that about Franklin made me feel even grosser than catching myself enjoying Son of War had yesterday.

  Apart from the hair, I couldn’t detect much change in Franklin. Mostly he just looked tired. His skin seemed grayer, and if anything his pebble eyes had grown even duller behind his glasses. He still wore the same bright-orange hoodie. The same chains bound his wrists and ankles. The same two guards stood on either side of him like unenthusiastic backup singers.

  “Hi,” he said.

  “Hi.” I nodded toward the window behind him and hoped my voice sounded casual. “It’s been cold, huh?”

  He glanced over his shoulder, his chains clanking. “I wouldn’t know. I haven’t been outside since I got here.”

  Brilliant idea, Mom.

  “I don’t have windows in my room either, so I’ve barely even seen what it looks like.”

  Another thing that apparently hadn’t changed: Franklin’s determination to make our conversations as awkward as possible. I turned to one of the guards. “Is it okay if we switch?”

  “I didn’t mean—” Franklin began.

  “No, you should have the view this time.”

  “Really, I don’t—”

  “It’s only fair.”
>
  We changed places, the guard keeping a hand on Franklin’s shoulder as she walked him around the table.

  He slumped into his new seat. “Thanks,” he muttered. His eyes wandered over the lake behind me. His chains clinked as he raised his hands and pointed. “It’s pretty.”

  I looked back at the view. “Yeah.”

  “Sort of frozen and empty and dead, but in a nice way.”

  “Uh-huh.” I nodded like he’d just said something completely normal. “Bleak, I guess you’d call it.”

  “Bleak,” he repeated, firing the final k off the back of his tongue.

  I stole another look at Franklin and noticed something. That morning, I’d thought Lydia was miserable, but it had turned out she was just exhausted. In the same way, now that I could see Franklin better with the fading daylight landing on his face, I realized he wasn’t exhausted. He was miserable. Behind his glasses, red rimmed his dull eyes, and his eyelashes stuck together in clumps. Maybe that explained why he’d resisted when I’d proposed we change places. Maybe he hadn’t wanted me to see. He must’ve felt my eyes on him now, because his face wriggled, like an insect was crawling over his cheek. As if to redirect my attention, he said, “How’s school?”

  “Same as usual, I guess.” I racked my brain for news to share, but everything I came up with seemed inappropriate. Preparations for the Big Bang anniversary assembly? Concerns among Duluth Central students about Franklin’s procedure? Of course, I could always tell him about how Tor had taken up with one of our mutual best friends, ended our clandestine nonrelationship, and threatened to do horrible things to me if anyone found out about it.

  “What about Tor? How’s he?”

  I jumped. His eyes were still resting on the lake. Had that capsule in his brain given him the power to read minds? If so, mine must’ve blared with thoughts of Tor. He hadn’t left my head for more than a second all day. My back still felt sore from when he’d slammed me against that door.

  I hoped none of that showed on my face while I said, “He’s the same as usual too. Why do you ask?”

  Franklin shrugged. “He’s your friend, isn’t he?”

  I nodded but didn’t say anything. He shifted his sneakers on the floor, and his chains made noise. The conversation wasn’t coming easily, but at least we hadn’t started yelling at each other yet, and at least he was making an effort now too.

  More than anything, I wanted to ask him if he felt different, if he thought the procedure had worked, but Mom wouldn’t consider that neutral conversation. Anyway, he could always lie.

  He pointed out the window again. “Is that the kind of thing you like to draw?”

  I cast another glance over my shoulder. Outside, the wind had blown up, scraping loose sheets of snow across the surface of the lake. “Sure, sometimes I do landscapes. Once I did a view of the lake really similar to this, except in summer.”

  “So not as bleak.”

  I laughed. “Yeah. Not as bleak.”

  He nodded as he considered the view. The wind moaned behind me. Pulling himself out of his slouch a little, he said, “Listen, I should probably set the record straight about something I told you last time.”

  “What’s that?”

  “When I said I didn’t like art, I was just messing with you. I do. Not landscapes, though. Portraits. So maybe we share an interest after all.”

  I could’ve sworn his eyes glanced off mine for a split second as he said it, like actual eye contact, but it happened so fast I couldn’t be sure. That image I’d received last night sprang to the front of my mind, along with the crazy theory that Franklin might’ve somehow sent it. My neck tingling, I watched his face, waiting for another sign, something more definitive. I even opened my mouth to speak, but I caught myself just in time. What could I possibly say? Excuse me, just wondering: while you’ve been busy recovering from your brain surgery, did you happen to get onto a computer, paint a painstakingly detailed picture of my face, and anonymously send it to me?

  Instead I said, “Maybe more than one. I tried playing Son of War yesterday, just to see what it was like.”

  His eyebrows scrunched a little. “Really?”

  “Uh-huh. I did okay, but I’m not a master soldier like you or anything.” I rubbed my palms together and felt some residual paint crumble from my skin. “I liked playing it though. I didn’t think I would.”

  I waited for him to come out with a smug remark about my change of heart, but he stayed quiet.

  “You were probably right that my brother should’ve played that game. If he had, maybe he wouldn’t have gotten killed.” Now I was the one who couldn’t make eye contact. I stared at my paint-flecked hands.

  Franklin resettled himself in his chair. His chains rustled. “I’ve told you I’m one of the top-ranked players in the world, right?”

  Jesus, not that again. “Yeah, you might’ve mentioned it.”

  “And that includes some of the finest soldiers on the planet, because the game’s actually used in mil—”

  “Military training programs around the world. Right.”

  “So in a way, you could say I’m better trained than most soldiers.”

  “Okay, I get it, Franklin.”

  His chains made more noise as he shifted around again. He seemed to be having trouble getting comfortable. When he next spoke, his voice had dropped nearly to a whisper. “But I used to die too. All the time.”

  The light from the window behind me had almost disappeared. The glow falling over Franklin’s face had turned bluish.

  “Sometimes within the first five minutes,” he said. “The way Son of War’s designed, it’s a little different every game, so no matter how many times you play, you can still get surprised. No matter how good you are, once in a while you just die. Like in real life.”

  His face was still nearly expressionless, but in some subtle way I couldn’t put my finger on, it had shifted. Maybe it was just my imagination, or maybe it had something to do with the light, but his eyes didn’t look dull and dead anymore. At least to me, at least right then, they appeared to have depth and feeling.

  “I wanted to set the record straight about that, too. What I said about your brother last time wasn’t accurate. Just because he got popped . . . got killed, doesn’t mean he wasn’t a superior soldier. Even a highly skilled player can have bad luck and get taken out of the game.”

  He dropped his hands into his lap with a clank.

  “And your brother only got to play once.”

  He went still and stared, like the speech had drained him of energy.

  Neither of us spoke for a while.

  One of the guards coughed.

  I shook my head. “I don’t know. My mom once said Ethan just wasn’t a killer. I think she meant it like it was a good thing, but the truth is, I wish he had been. I wish it every day. Or better yet, I wish I’d been there myself, so I could’ve pulled the trigger for him.”

  His gaze lifted. This time our eyes really did connect. He looked straight at me, and in that moment, I understood why these conversations with Franklin kept circling back to my brother. Ethan hadn’t pulled the trigger when he’d had the chance, and Franklin had. Maybe Franklin and I both wanted to understand why.

  I glanced at one of the cameras attached to the ceiling, only then remembering Mom. I never talked like this about Ethan’s death around her. It must’ve come as a shock to hear me just now, even though she’d said almost the same thing herself a couple days ago. But maybe all the valuable data our conversation was yielding would soften the blow. And by the way, hadn’t it been five minutes yet?

  Franklin’s head sagged forward. He reached up and to one side with his chained-together hands so he could touch the bandage on the back of his skull.

  “I guess you know what it feels like to be angry like that,” I said.

  He kept probing his wound with his fingertips. I started to think maybe I’d made him uncomfortable or even offended him, but then he said, “I was angry all the
time. I woke up angry, and I went to bed angry. At school I was angriest of all. The only time I didn’t feel angry was when I was playing Son of War and killing things. It relaxed me. I always thought that was kind of funny.”

  He looked up, out the window behind me, and I glanced back too. The daylight had drained away altogether now. The window had become an indigo rectangle.

  “That was why I thought up my mission,” he said. “It felt good to imagine going into school with a plan and a weapon and targets, just like in the game.”

  My belly sucked in a little at his mention of targets. The question that had stuck in my brain for a year screamed for an answer. Was I one of them?

  The overhead lights had automatically brightened now that the sun had gone down. They covered Franklin’s face in bland light, but the subtle change I’d noticed in his eyes lingered.

  “My mission even had a name,” he went on. “Son of War High. For a long time I just liked picturing exactly how I’d do it, but then one day that wasn’t enough anymore. I realized if I could play all the way through my mission for real, at the end I might stay relaxed permanently.”

  By “stay relaxed permanently,” he meant he’d planned to kill himself. That much I understood. Those assholes will pay, that comment he’d left on the Son of War subreddit said. A bullet for each one. And then a bullet for me.

  “I really did feel that way when I put on my mask in class and fired my gun. Relaxed, like I was playing Son of War.” He paused to take a slow breath. “But then I was stopped.”