Tattoo Atlas

by Tim Floreen

  I sat in the Saab a second, my hands on the steering wheel, my back clammy with sweat. I cast my eyes around the garage one more time. Nothing. I pulled the lock back up and eased the door open a crack. Stopped. Listened.

  In one rush, I shouldered the door the rest of the way open, swung out my legs, and sprinted toward the garage door. I’d almost made it when a voice said, “Why are you running, Rem?”

  I let out a yell. My car keys clattered to the floor. I whipped my head around and caught a flash of traffic-cone orange in a corner.

  A hoodie.

  Inside the hood, a pair of glasses.

  Franklin stepped forward. “Sorry. I keep scaring you. I promise I’m not doing it on purpose.”

  I grabbed his shoulders—because I was happy to see him, and because I thought I might keel over if I didn’t—and panted, “You want to stop scaring me? Try ringing the goddamn doorbell once in a while. Jesus, I thought you were Tor.”

  “Why Tor?” His voice sounded funny. He’d stiffened when I’d taken his shoulders in my hands. It took me a second to remember he probably thought I’d already reported him and Nil to the police. After the way I’d reamed him over the phone, I couldn’t blame him for being standoffish.

  “Because he’s the one who killed Callie,” I said. “I’m sure of it. Just a few minutes ago I was up in his room, and I realized he had a clear view of the gazebo in my backyard, and the rest just clicked into place.”

  Everything else I’d figured out tumbled from my mouth in a breathless rush. Franklin listened without saying a word, just studying the drain in the middle of the garage’s concrete floor, his nostrils expanding and contracting as he breathed.

  “So right away I left his place and raced over here. I was afraid he might come after me. That’s why I was acting like a maniac just now. He could probably see I’d figured things out. We’re probably in danger. You don’t have a gun, do you?”

  His forehead scrunched. “Why would I have a gun?”

  “I don’t know. Look, I’m sorry for what I said to you before, Franklin. Tor’s a monster. I see that now. He killed Callie. Tried to kill Lydia. Probably wants to kill me. And I know he did something horrible to you too. I read your notebook. I know he took you down to the steam tunnels.”

  Franklin flinched. His hands squeezed into fists.

  “It’s okay,” I said, “you don’t have to tell me about it. It just makes me so mad to think I didn’t realize what he was before this.” I noticed my own hands had balled themselves up too. I uncurled my fingers and shook them out. “The good news is we can go to the police now. We don’t have to lie anymore.”

  “Do you have proof it was him?”

  “Not yet, but I’m sure if we tell the police what we know, they’ll find something.”

  “That won’t be good enough.”

  A faint banging came from outside. Something blowing in the storm probably, but the noise made me antsy anyway. I imagined Tor pounding on the front door, trying to get into the house. “Look, we can talk about it on the way. Right now we have to get out of here. I still think Tor might try something.”

  I started pulling Franklin toward the car, but he didn’t budge. “What were you doing in Tor’s room just now?”

  I stopped. The wind outside screamed.

  “The same thing you do with him down in the steam tunnels?” Franklin asked. “Because it sounded like when he takes you down there, you like it.”

  I took a step back and shoved my hands into my coat pockets. “He texted me when I got home. He was upset about Callie. At least that was what he said. He asked me to go over there and keep him company.”

  “And you didn’t mess around?”

  Hot blood pulsed behind my cheeks and forehead. “Not exactly.”

  Franklin gnawed his lower lip. “The way you kissed me last night, I thought . . .” He gave his head a sharp shake and lunged forward to grab my car keys from where I’d dropped them on the floor, swiping his arm angrily. He must’ve misjudged the distance, because instead of grabbing them he knocked them to the side. They skated across the floor. He chased after them. Stopped. Dropped to his hands and knees.

  “What happened?” I said.

  “They fell down the drain.”

  “But we need them. We need to get out of here.”

  He studied the drain a minute before sitting back on his heels and shaking his head. “They’re gone.”

  My stomach twisted itself inside out. I could’ve sworn I’d just heard more banging outside. “Look, my mom has a spare key for when she needs to move my car, but I think it’s in her office, and she keeps that door locked. Maybe you could pick the lock, though. I mean, you’re good at that kind of stuff, right? Or else we could just bash the door down. With everything that’s happening, I bet she’d under—”

  “Can you just tell me something, Rem?” He hadn’t risen from his spot on the floor next to the drain. “How do you feel about me?”

  I fiddled with the partly unraveled end of my long blue scarf. “That’s a complicated question, Franklin. Way too complicated to answer right now, when someone’s probably trying to kill us.”

  “No, it’s not. It’s really simple. Do you care about me?”

  “Of course I do, Franklin.”

  “What about if I’d never had the procedure? Would you still care about me then?”

  “Now that’s definitely too complicated—”

  “Tell me.”

  I took a careful breath. “I guess I probably wouldn’t. At least not the way I do now.”

  He nodded.

  “I’m sorry if that’s not what you wanted to hear, but I don’t want to lie to you. I don’t want to just be Mr. Nice Guy. I want to be honest, especially with you.”

  He ran his palm over his shaved head. His fingers probed the Band-Aid at the back of his skull.

  “Look,” I said, “I’m sorry I went to Tor’s tonight. And I’m sorry for what I said on the phone too. I was confused. This is a confusing situation. The important thing is I’ve figured out who killed Callie. I know how to clear you. Can’t we forget all the other stuff and move on?”

  His fingers dropped away from the hole in his head. He nodded. “You’re right.” He stood and turned to face me. His eyes looked as dull as they had during our first session at the Mother Ship. “Show me where your mom’s office is, and get me a flashlight and a nail file. I can get the door open for you.”

  Franklin crouched next to Mom’s office door, a penlight between his teeth, and went to work. A few minutes later, the door swung open.

  “I’ll look for the keys,” I told him. “Can you check the house? Make sure all the doors are locked? And the windows, too. We shouldn’t forget about those. You taught me that.”

  He didn’t say anything, just gave a silent nod and moved off. I bit my lip as I watched him head toward the front door. He hadn’t spoken a word since the garage. It was like his face had slammed shut again.

  I went into Mom’s office and switched on her lamp, figuring I’d start by searching through her desk drawers. I didn’t make it that far, though. My eye had already caught on a row of empty wine bottles lined up against the wall on her desk. In front of them lay a hand-addressed envelope. According to the return address, it had come from Sam Durham, the soldier who’d visited the house the other day. I thought again of what Nil had said about a connection between Mom’s work and the US military. Did this have something to do with that? But this letter didn’t have the appearance of official correspondence. It looked personal. And Sam had said he was a civilian now, hadn’t he? Judging from the postmark, he’d sent the letter the day after his visit.

  I slid the single folded sheet of paper from the envelope, dropped into Mom’s office chair, and read.

  Dear Dr. Braithwaite,

  I hope you don’t mind me writing you this letter. I figured an e-mail sent to your work address, which is the only one I have, might too easily be seen by the wrong person, and I mean
this message for you alone.

  I realize I already stated my case to you in person a few days ago, but that was before the death of that poor girl, Franklin Kettle’s classmate. I honestly don’t know if Franklin had anything to do with that. Her killer could just be a copycat, but as I write this, the police are saying they aren’t ruling out any possibilities.

  Was it him, Dr. Braithwaite? Was that girl’s death somehow related to your project? I’d like to think it wasn’t, but I’m afraid that might not be the case.

  You’re a good person. I could tell when I met you at Ethan’s funeral, and I had the same feeling about you after talking with you yesterday. But I still disagree with what you’re doing. I believe good people are capable of doing bad things. If I’ve learned nothing else from my time in Afghanistan, I’ve learned that.

  I think I understand your reasons, though. You imagine this procedure might prevent deaths like your son’s. You imagine if you could’ve switched your son’s conscience off the way you switched Franklin’s on, maybe he would’ve fired his weapon and he’d still be alive. But let me tell you, I did fire my weapon, I did kill that child, and whatever I am now, I’m not sure you’d call it alive.

  The child was crying. Did I mention that? Maybe that was what stopped Ethan. No one in that room wanted to be a killer, but only Ethan chose not to fire his weapon. And your project seeks to suppress the part of the brain that kept your son from shooting a weeping child? I’m sorry, but I can’t believe that’s right.

  When I saw you, I promised I wouldn’t say anything publicly about the true nature of your work. I’d still like to honor that promise, but I’m finding it harder and harder to do so. I beg you, Dr. Braithwaite, stop what you’re doing. Don’t make Franklin your guinea pig. Stop turning his conscience on and off like a light switch. It’s wrong. It’s cruel. It’s dangerous.

  Yours truly,

  Sam Durham

  I grabbed my phone and dialed Mom, my heart thudding. “Answer,” I chanted under my breath. “Answer. Answer. Answer.” I shook off my winter coat while I waited. Sweat drenched my armpits and slid down my back. I listened for sounds of Franklin moving around but couldn’t hear any. Just the roaring of the storm. No banging, either. Whatever had caused that noise earlier had gone silent just before we’d entered the house.

  Mom finally picked up. “This isn’t a good time, Rem, I’m right in the middle of—”

  “You lied to me again.” The rage in my voice as I growled the words startled even me. “I just read Sam Durham’s letter. What the hell does he mean when he says you’re turning Franklin’s conscience on and off like a light switch?”

  “Calm down, Rem. Listen to me. There are parts of the project that are classified. Sam Durham isn’t supposed to know about them either.” She’d shifted into press conference mode again and was speaking in smooth, precise sentences. “He has an indiscreet friend at DARPA, one of his buddies from the unit. I’m sorry, I know this is hard to hear, but I can’t discuss the confidential aspects of our work, even with—”

  “Bullshit, Mom. Tell me. Is it true you’re exploring military applications for your capsule? Figuring out how to make sociopathic supersoldiers or something?”

  She didn’t answer right away. I imagined her in her office jabbing her thumb with her fingernail. “Those aren’t the words I’d use. We’re working on technology that can ease soldiers’ moral inhibitions in certain combat situations.”

  “And how’s Franklin involved?” I demanded.

  “Rem, let’s talk about this when I get—”

  “No, Mom. It has to be now.”

  The banging noise outside had started up again, like an echo of the banging inside my own chest.

  “I think you’re blowing this out of proportion,” Mom said. “The capsule we installed in Franklin’s brain emits pulses of energy that stimulate his empathy centers, like I explained to you the other day. But we can also modulate the pulses so they inhibit his ability to feel empathy instead, the same way the nanodrones did.”

  “And make him like he was when he killed Pete.” My fingers tightened around the letter, crumpling it. I wanted to yell and scream at the top of my lungs. I wanted to reach through the phone and shake Mom and demand to know how she could keep lying to me, her own son, this way. But right now I needed to concentrate. I took a breath to help steady my voice. “So have you tried inhibiting his empathy yet?”

  “We’re just starting that phase of testing.”

  “What about on the night of Callie’s murder? Did you turn him back into a sociopath then?”

  “No, Rem. That couldn’t have been him. Dr. Hult verified he was inside the lab all night.”

  I swallowed through a dry throat. The banging continued. I tried to listen for Franklin again, but wherever he’d gone, he still wasn’t making any noise. I hunched over Mom’s desk and dropped my voice. “No, he wasn’t. He figured out how to hack the lab’s security and escape.”

  “That can’t be—”

  “I saw him, Mom. He came to our house.”

  She released a slow exhale. “Dear God. And you didn’t say anything?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “But why—”

  “Are you sure the capsule’s setting couldn’t have gotten switched that night?”

  “I don’t know.” I could hear her struggling to keep her voice under control, the same way I was. The press conference smoothness had fallen away. “The lab’s computer system monitors and controls the capsule when it’s within range of the Wi-Fi network. Dr. Hult used the system to search for irregularities the morning after Callie’s death. He didn’t find anything. But if Franklin figured out how to hack our system . . .”

  “You think he might’ve changed the setting himself?”

  “It’s possible. Oh God, could he have?”

  I crushed the letter some more. Why would he do that? He’d wanted to feel empathy. He’d said so himself. Unless that had been a lie. I’d seen how much suffering his newly acquired remorse had caused him. Had it finally become too much for him to take? That still didn’t make sense, though. The argument he’d made himself still held: why would he have come to visit me just before the murder? The Franklin I’d seen in the gazebo, the one who’d played me that music and argued with me about tattoos and given me that unexpectedly mind-blowing kiss—he hadn’t been someone planning to kill.

  “And that’s the only way to control the capsule?” I said. “Just the computer system?”

  “No. There’s one other way. Dr. Hult also installed a fail-safe inside the capsule itself in case our computer system ever went down. The capsule contains a microphone and voice recognition software. It’s programmed to switch between modes when it hears one of two phrases.”

  “And what are they?”

  “For God’s sake, Rem,” she said, losing it now, “why didn’t you tell me Franklin got out of the lab?”

  “Mom, the phrases!”

  I shot a glance over my shoulder, hoping Franklin hadn’t heard.

  When Mom spoke again, my pounding heart came to a full stop. “You remember that Emily Dickinson poem? Ethan’s favorite?”

  At that moment Mom was standing at the floor-to-ceiling window in her office and staring at the snow barraging the glass as she held her phone to her ear. Just as I’d imagined, the nail of her left index finger jabbed the numb pad of her thumb, searching for some sensation.

  “The first verse makes the capsule inhibit Franklin’s empathy centers,” she said. “The last one stimulates them.”

  “And how do you have the capsule set now? You said you’d just started the next phase of testing. What does that mean?”

  “We changed the setting on the capsule to inhibit his empathy for the first time a few hours ago. We thought we’d give his brain a chance to adjust while he sleeps. We plan to start testing tomorrow.” She shook her head at the window like I was standing on the other side, out in the storm. “I know what you’re probably thinking
of me, Rem. But I want you to know I did this for Ethan. You can understand that, can’t you?” She turned away from the glass. “Now tell me, has Franklin escaped any other times?”

  I didn’t answer. She looked at the phone screen to check the connection.

  “Rem? Are you there?”

  Mom’s eyes went wide. She lunged for the door and flung it open.

  “Gertie?”

  The lab tech looked up and yanked out an earbud blaring something dissonant and experimental sounding. The rest of the main lab stood empty. Everyone else had gone home.

  “When was the last time you checked on Franklin?” Mom said.

  “A few minutes ago. Why?”

  “Check now.”

  “Something wrong?”

  “Goddamnit, Gertie, just do it.”

  Gertie tapped on her keyboard and pulled up an image of Franklin’s room on her screen. Mom stood behind her with her arms crossed over her chest. “Fast asleep,” Gertie said.

  On the screen Franklin lay on his side, his face visible, his eyes closed.

  Mom pressed her lips tight together while she studied the image. “Let’s go have a look.”

  She took the elevator down one floor, charged out through the whooshing doors, and banged down the corridor in her high heels. Gertie hurried after, her asymmetrically cut hair bouncing as she went. Mom didn’t offer any explanations on the way. She was too busy trying to call me back on her phone.

  “Is he in there?” She fired the question at the guard outside Franklin’s room.

  He looked confused. “Of course he is.”

  “Have you taken any breaks? Even for a minute?”

  “Just once, to visit the restroom.”

  Mom elbowed him away from the door and peered through the little window. A shape lay on the bed beneath a mound of white covers. Gertie squinted over her shoulder. “There he is, just like on the—”