The New Girl (Downside)

by S. L. Grey

  She knocks again. Tries the handle. It opens smoothly. She steps into the hallway. It’s gloomy inside, the daylight floating through the front door doing little to banish the shadows. The sound of the traffic on Excelsior Avenue seems to fade away, as if the place sits in its own vacuum. She stands absolutely still, listens for any sign of life. Nothing. It’s almost too quiet. The last thing she feels like doing is heading up the stairs that end in solid blackness. No, she’ll try the kitchen first. Leaving the arched doorway open so that the hallway’s meagre light leaches through, she fumbles on the wall for the light switch. Unable to find it, she digs out her phone and clicks on the torch app she’s never had reason to use before.

  ‘Hello? Jane?’

  The first thing she notices as she sweeps the light around the room is that the appliances are all gone; the countertops are clear of clutter. The room smells musty, unused, like a house that’s been allowed to decay for decades. But how can this be? She saw Jane here only yesterday.

  She should leave right now. What if that Ryan guy is still hiding out here, waiting to pounce? It’s a huge property, must be loads of nooks and crannies in which someone could avoid detection. No one knows she’s here. Anything could happen to her.

  Ignoring her instincts, which are begging her to flee back into the sunlight, she finds herself making for the green door at the far end of the kitchen. It opens onto some sort of dusty, plastered corridor that appears to bend and weave through the house. Using the phone’s glow to light her way, she follows it, stumbling occasionally on the uneven floor. Taking a narrow stairwell to her left, she walks up numbly, trying in vain to get a handle on the house’s odd layout. It leads to another anonymous corridor, this one lined with cheap plasterboard doors. She opens them at random: a small tiled area containing nothing but a rusty bed frame; a couple of empty bedrooms; a room stacked with rusty water heaters and a leaking bag of cement. The last door in the passageway is slightly ajar. She pauses outside it, her hand caught halfway to the jamb, flooded with the overwhelming impression that there’s something behind it, waiting to jump out at her.

  ‘Hello?’ she calls, her voice cracking. Hand trembling, she turns the handle, opens the door quickly before she loses her nerve. There’s no furniture in the room – a dingy, brown-carpeted space – but there’s a row of jars on the shelf below the cardboard-blinded window. She walks forward, stops dead when she realises the jars each contain an insect of some type. Most appear to be spiders – including the curled corpse of a baboon spider, but there are also a couple of scorpions, several grasshoppers and a hulking Parktown prawn. She gasps in disgust when she spots a large coffee jar at the far edge of the collection, the headless body of a giant rat squashed into its base.

  She holds her breath, listening again for any sign that she’s not alone. Thinks she hears something scrape in the bowels of the house.

  She backtracks in panic, her soggy breath loud in her ears. Disorientated, she takes a turning at random. Is this the way she came? She whirls around, starts running, almost tumbles down the stairs at the end of the corridor. Runs blindly on, ends up face to face with a door. Is it the one that leads to the kitchen? She turns the handle, steps inside the room, blinking as bright light sears her eyes. What in the hell? The lights glare down at her from the ceiling; while she’s been rambling around the house, someone has been here, turned them on. And that’s not all. There’s a briefcase on the counter next to the sink. She’s positive it wasn’t here before.

  Move! she screams to herself, lunging towards the arched doorway that leads into the hallway and freedom. She’s only a metre away when it opens. She backs up against the counter as a man walks through it, pushing an old-fashioned fedora back on his head.

  He smiles broadly at her. His features are regular and instantly forgettable. His tweed suit looks too heavy for the weather. ‘Tara Elizabeth Marais? Thrilled to parts to encounter you. I’ve been out in the wilderness investigating.’

  She nods, tries to catch her breath. ‘Who are you?’ She’s relieved it isn’t Ryan, but how could this stranger know her name? ‘You a cop?’ That must be it.

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘A policeman? Are you from the police?’

  ‘Ah,’ he chuckles. ‘An upside law-enforcer? I am not, but thank you for the tribute.’ He shuffles to the sink and turns on the tap. ‘Hygiene first.’

  As he washes his hands, she notices that he’s missing three fingers on his left hand. The remaining digits – his thumb and ring finger – give it the look of a fleshy crab claw. She tries not to shudder.

  ‘Then who are you? And how did you know my name?’

  ‘Excuse me for being discourteous. I am Node Agent Rosen. On option for Varder Batiss.’

  ‘Varder Batiss?’ Tara whispers.

  ‘Yes. This is his former node residence.’

  ‘Varder Batiss lives here?’ How can that be? Is the man who commissioned her to make Baby Tommy embroiled somehow with Ryan? Could Batiss be Jane’s father? And it can’t be a coincidence that Jane and Martin have both disappeared. Tara struggles to piece it together. The only conclusion she can reach is that Ryan, Batiss, and possibly whoever has been running Encounters are involved in some kind of child abduction racket. Christ...

  Usually I would not be conducting these matters, but Varder Batiss’s sub-assistant has recently... depreciated.’

  Guts churning, Tara struggles to keep calm. ‘Oh. I’m sorry to hear that.’

  ‘Don’t be apologetic. Happens to everyone, does it not? Varder Batiss personally approved his recycling.’

  What the hell does that mean? ‘Did you follow me here?’ She’s not sure what else to ask, what to say. If these people are involved in something as serious as child abduction, she needs to tread carefully.

  ‘Oh yes. I have been tracking you since you reneged on your agreement. Renege – that is the correct parlance, is it not?’ He chuckles again. ‘I’m working on my pronunciation.’

  ‘I explained to your boss that I can’t provide the baby. There was a mishap with him.’

  ‘A mishap?’

  Tara digs in her bag, removes Baby Tommy’s burnt head. ‘This.’

  He peers down at it, doesn’t seem surprised that she’s just pulled a charred baby’s head out of her bag. He clucks his tongue. ‘Oopsie doopsie. What a karking mess.’ He reaches for his briefcase, clicks it open. ‘I usually do shortfall insurance collections, viables and the like, but lucky for you I was in this exact upside node location dealing with a matter that is now resolved.’ He chuckles. ‘I don’t think I need share that contracts are my reason for subsisting.’

  ‘Why does Batiss want this baby?’

  ‘Want?’ He chuckles again. ‘He doesn’t want.’

  ‘But what was he going to do with him?’

  ‘Mrs Tara Marais, I do not know the answer to that question. I am not here to question why, only to deal with the repercussions of a breach. Now. I believe you embarked on a signalled contract. Not a primo method, but Varder Batiss felt you were a... trustworthy br— upside citizen. I am assured that in the law of this node, signals – electronic messages, you call them? – are as acceptable as triplicate contracts, so I won’t waste your time with dilly-dallying. The penalty you have been assured of, have you not?’

  ‘What is this penalty?’

  He waves his claw-hand vaguely. ‘Oh dotting the eyes and tutting the tees.’

  ‘I don’t understand. I’ve said that I’ll return the money.’

  He actually laughs. ‘Money? You mean brown currency? Oh no.’

  ‘What do you want with me?’ There’s something in his hand; it’s blocky and shiny – a gun? She needs to get out of here, she needs to run. But her legs feel heavy, as if her shoes are glued to the floor.

  ‘Don’t concern yourself, Mrs Marais,’ he says, darting forward. ‘This won’t hurt a bit.’

  Chapter 21

  PENTER

  Father was wrong. The karking upside ha
lfpint was missed and dust was kicked up. But all should be primo now. Penter has read and initialled Node Agent Rosen’s report on his dealings with the School Principal Duvenhage. There were no complications. The sweep is complete. Dispatching a node agent was one of Father’s tasks, but Penter has found it remarkably unchallenging to discharge his duties.

  Or should she say Varder Batiss’s duties, for she now knows his real name. She’s tried to think of him as Varder Batiss, but the name doesn’t sit easily. He will always be Father to her.

  She paces through her living quarters. She has filed her reports, she has done her duty, so why does she feel so karking stale? Is she still poisoned by blissful love? Or is the thought-seep still muddying her mind? Her penetration is renewed every second Moneyday at Dead Shift, which makes it just two shifts to go. The thought calms her, but she hasn’t received the confirmation signal from the clinic yet, which she should have received a shift ago. Just a clerical error, she hopes.

  She fingers the last of the ready beans she smuggled back from the precinct, several of which are now limp and decaying. They do not taste the same at home as they did in the precinct. And she is not as comfortable in her quiet pod as she used to be. She’s too used to hearing the whir of the machines outside the precinct gate, the bang and shriek of Jane’s documents, the chatter of the birds and the scratching of Jane’s pets. Here there is only the hum of the great wheel in the Bowels.

  It is too quiet.

  She opens her locker, retrieves the mimeograph of Father she purloined from the precinct kitchen. She wonders what form his punishment will take. He has many periods of service left before his scheduled depreciation, so perhaps the Ministry will be lenient. He has played, there is no doubt, but he is efficient. Does he blame her for doing her duty and reporting his disregard to the Ministry? Does he even think of her at all?

  She hears a cough, turns to see Bakewell Klot, one of Management’s Security Agents, lurking in her doorway. She fumbles the mimeograph back into the locker, hopes that he will not ask her what she is doing.

  ‘Penter Ulliel,’ he says. ‘First Minister Cardineal Phelgm requests your presence in the Ministry Boardroom.’

  Penter gasps. In all her periods she has only once been called to the boardroom – when she was notified of her lifework assignment and installed. Why would someone as senior as Cardineal Phelgm want to see her?

  Could it be a matter regarding Jane? It was, after all, Jane who invited the brown educator into the precinct on Father’s orders. Penter is also concerned about Jane’s dealings with that purloined brown – Ryan – although Manestream Lygoate, one of Penter’s immediate superiors, told her that Jane’s experiment has been authorised. Penter has high regard for Jane, feels a sense of protectiveness for her – a feeling that she knows will disappear when she undergoes her penetration renewal.

  ‘Thank you, Bakewell Klot,’ she manages to respond. ‘I will hurry.’

  She checks to make sure her uniform is pristine, then follows Bakewell Klot towards the lifts.

  She clasps her shaking hands behind her back as they glide up to the Ministry levels. The lift doors slide open and Klot bids her farewell as she exits onto an unnumbered floor in the upper domain.

  One of Cardineal Phelgm’s underlings rushes forward and bares his stripped gums at her. She can tell by his primo bodily modifications, which include facial and limb amputations, that Cardineal Phelgm must hold this underling in high regard.

  ‘Penter Ulliel,’ he says, ‘I am First Underling Janus Stoat. Please, come this way.’

  He guides her across the greeting area towards the towering boardroom doors. Flakes of gold in the floor tiles twinkle beneath her feet, and she scans the portraits of past Ministry officials that line the walls. They are hallowed faces in the annals of the Administration, and she can name every one. Her hands are no longer shaking. The upper domain is impressive, but it is not as overawing as she remembers from her installation. She was still a halfpint then, scared and impressionable.

  She follows him through the doors and into the boardroom itself. Cardineal Phelgm is squatting at his desk at the far end, a cloud of lesser and senior underlings chained discreetly to a flotilla of desks in front of him. Underling Stoat ushers her forward.

  She has heard rumours that Cardineal Phelgm is fused to his desk because he is fearful of upstarts grasping his position. As far as Penter is aware, he has never left the boardroom since he was invested, receives even his penetration renewals, periodic modifications and victuals connected to his chair. She feels a stirring of distaste at the sight of his greenish-white skin and bloated jowls. He reminds her of the depreciated thing she saw floating in the precinct pool, but she knows that his stripped veins and amputations are of the most opulent quality and should be esteemed. She needs to watch her words very carefully. In this room, she needs even to watch her thoughts.

  ‘Penter Ulliel,’ he says, gazing at her through his single modified eye. ‘May I commend you on your catalogue performance. The viable has been successfully integrated.’ Penter nods, feeling the warmth of regard flushing her veins.

  Cardineal Phelgm grunts and waves one of his stumps at Underling Stoat. ‘You may proceed.’

  Underling Stoat plucks a file from the towering stack of papers piled around Cardineal Phelgm’s head. Penter recognises it as the report she made on Father.

  ‘Is this the entirety of the matter, Penter Ulliel?’ Cardineal Phelgm grunts.

  ‘Yes, your Superiority,’ she says.

  Cardineal Phelgm rolls his eye. ‘Truly, it is almost as if this Varder Batiss is asking to be recycled.’ He makes a rumbling sound in his throat and the underlings laugh along with him.

  Penter does not laugh. The bile is rising in her stomach. Is Father to be terminated? She cannot help but speak. ‘Your Superiority?’ she says, her entrails cramping at her temerity. ‘May I enquire as to Father – to Varder Batiss’s – punishment?’

  ‘You may not,’ Cardineal Phelgm barks, and the room falls silent. ‘It is not in your purview. But for your information, Penter Ulliel...’ – he sneers, or smiles, she’s not sure which – ‘this is by no means the only transgression of Varder Batiss.’

  He leans forward, uses the microtech pincers fused to his other stump to push a sheaf of papers towards her.

  She looks down at the file, which she has not seen before. It is from Node Agent Rosen, the same agent she dispatched to deal with that man Duvenhage.

  She reads it in disbelief, can barely keep her features neutral.

  This was not authorised. This was not discussed. The extent of Father’s playing is disregardful in the extreme. It seems that Ryan is not the only brown that Father has scouted unauthorised.

  ‘Penter Ulliel,’ Cardineal Phelgm grumbles, ‘you can resolve this?’

  She nods.

  ‘You must decide how to dispose of this unauthorised brown. If you wish to terminate it, you will have the full cooperation of the Terminal Ward.’

  He sinks back in his chair, closes his eye. She is dismissed.

  She exits the boardroom, intent on undergoing her penetration renewal immediately. It can’t be healthy to feel this way.

  But when she reaches the lifts she does not press the button for Level H. Instead, almost as if her hand is following a command of its own, she chooses one that will glide her down to the senior Ministry Apartments.

  To where Father keeps his private quarters.

  Chapter 22

  RYAN

  Ryan stands up groggily and wipes the blood off his chin. That upsized Number Two was heavy going, but he knows that now he’ll be nourished for the next several shifts. He vacuums the rest of his SugarGas and, even though he’s full, crams a last fistful of Starchsticks into his mouth. They’re like popcorn. He elbows his way through the throng of Shoppers and Customer Care Officers cluttering the entrance to McColon’s and hurries back to the elevator bank. There are just a few moments until his next class.

  He s
cans his ID token over the pad marked ‘Academy Only’ and the lift doors glide open. He steps inside and they close again; he leans against the mirrored back wall and the lift starts moving. As they ascend – or descend; he’s not sure – the lift plays a panpipe rendition of a tune he’s heard before. The shunt hole at the base of his skull beneath his ear throbs as he tries to recall the title. This information is not directly relevant to today’s syllabus but it’s not completely obliterated either. He’s very lucky to have been deployed as a tutor and he knows it’s all Jane’s doing. She likes him.

  He spoke to a brown who worked somewhere in the Mall – at Nondegradable Polymer Playthings or Lonly Books – a couple of shifts ago. He’d just clicked out for victuals so was able to tell him how the shunt works on retail CCOs. Their scope is narrowed entirely to making sales and serving customers, especially Shoppers. As a tutor of Upside Relations classes, the breadth of Ryan’s upside experience contributes to the lessons, so his scope is set far wider.

  But he still can’t remember the title of this damn song.

  Not to worry. The lift doors slide open and he scans past the administration desk and into his class where the halfpints are waiting.

  When he taught his first lesson, a few shifts ago – time doesn’t really work the same down here – he experienced a shock of recognition when he saw the faces staring back at him. Their skin was mottled and pale, undertones of green and purple blushing through, scars from recent modifications still healing. He realised that he was looking at the same sort of kids who were arrayed in Duvenhage’s photographs; they weren’t dead or beaten, they were merely modified and marked up as examples for the upside scouting project. They were never harmed. In retrospect, after his job had been explained to him by the Assimilation Agent, he felt like such a fool for jumping to conclusions.