by David Ryker
Not crazy, her brain immediately corrected, and she felt the politician’s grin on her face tighten into a rictus.
She tried to focus on something else and so she turned her attention to her father chatting with an gentleman whose name she couldn’t remember, but she knew he was one of the Carver family, which was inextricably entwined with the Blooms in business ventures around the world and even off of it.
I don’t care about what’s out of the world, she scolded herself, and quickly moved to join the two in their conversation.
“Chelsea!” The Almeida gentleman took her free hand as she approached and shook it vigorously. “I was just telling your father here how important it was to make sure that we’re ready to fill Drake’s shoes the moment he abdicates. I think six months in the senate should be more than enough to establish you as tribune material, and Oscar here agrees.”
“She’s a natural,” her father said with a smile. “The people will love her.”
“With friends like you, we can’t lose,” she said. She was looking at Carver, but her mind was still trying to focus on something else.
“If only Melinda could have been here to see this,” Oscar sighed.
As always, thoughts of her mother were accompanied by a vague anxiety that she couldn’t define. Her death had been a defining part of Chelsea’s decision to finally take the plunge into politics, but every time she tried to think about her, her mind refused to focus. It must have been some sort of psychological defense mechanism that helped her to move on from the tragedy and into the good life that lay ahead.
Carver spoke, interrupting her thoughts. “At the risk of being an armchair policy maker, I think we obviously need to focus on the war looming between the factions. Morley Drake is not the person to lead the UFT when it finally comes. We need someone who can unite the people. And that person is you, Chelsea.”
“I absolutely agree,” she replied absently. “But we also have to keep the alien threat in mind. It may not be immediate, but it’s still there.”
Just then, she caught sight of a young East Indian man striding through the crowd toward her. Like all the others at the party, he was familiar but she couldn’t place his name. Unlike the others, however, she was genuinely happy to see him. Almost ecstatic, in fact.
“Hello!” she said brightly, ignoring her father and Carver and reaching out her hand to the newcomer. “So good to see you!”
“Chelsea,” he said, taking her hand warmly. “You can’t imagine how happy I am to see you.”
“I was just telling my father and this gentleman not to forget about the aliens,” she said. “You of all people will back me up on that, won’t you?”
Before any of them could respond, Chelsea saw Dr. Copeland rushing in their direction. Oh no, she thought bleakly. Not another episode. I thought I was done with them!
The doctor pulled Chelsea away from her guests and into an alcove in the nearby wall. Once there, the sounds of the party were muted, so that all Chelsea could hear was the woman’s voice.
“It’s all right,” she said, but the urgency in her violet eyes was telling Chelsea something else. “This is to be expected. Your symptoms will return periodically for a while yet. Now, tell me the strategy for when they do.”
“Just breathe and let them be,” Chelsea sighed. The phrase was tattooed in her mind by now, given how often she’d been forced to repeat it.
“And the aliens?”
“A projection of my subconscious to deal with the… the infection.” She still shuddered at the thought of worms in her brain. No wonder her mind had created the illusion.
“Excellent.” The doctor turned and looked into the room beyond. “I have to go.”
“Where?”
“I have to find someone.”
With that, the doctor disappeared into the crowd and Chelsea followed, seeking out the high rollers who would need a personal visit to satisfy their egos. She breathed deeply, allowing her thoughts to just be and trying not to dwell on them.
She spotted an ancient, patrician-looking couple near the grand piano and decided to make her way over. Anyone their age must have some insight into dealing with war, given how many they had lived through. On her way, she smiled and waved to everyone who looked in her direction, ever the charming hostess.
“Quit that.”
Chelsea almost walked right into a shorter woman with spiked golden hair who seemed to appear out of nowhere in front of her.
“Excuse me?” she sputtered.
“I told you to quit that,” said the woman. Her doe eyes were fierce yet oddly familiar, and she was aggressively blocking Chelsea’s path with her petite body. “Those people aren’t real.”
“She’s right.” The Indian man from earlier sidled up to the woman. “I’m sorry, Chelsea, I know this must be difficult, but you’re not really here. None of us are.”
Chelsea felt a wave of anxiety beginning to swell inside her again. She closed her eyes and took a breath.
“Just breathe and let them be,” she whispered. “Just breathe and let them be.”
“Fuck that,” the woman growled. “Get mad. And wake up.”
“You people need to leave.” Dr. Copeland appeared out of nowhere, pulling along a young dreadlocked security guard with her. She looked almost on the verge of panic. “I don’t know how you got in here, but you’re going. Now.”
“You may not know how we got here specifically,” the guard said, turning to the doctor to her obvious surprise, “but you were the one who brought us into this simulation.”
“Stop it!” Dr. Copeland cried. “Stop this right now! Chelsea, don’t listen to them! They’re illusions!”
“If we’re illusions, then how can you see us?” asked the Indian.
“You can’t be here! It’s impossible!”
Chelsea felt the familiar coppery taste of adrenaline as her heart began to work twice as hard. She had come so far without an episode and now this. It was enough to make her want to run from here and never look back.
And yet deep down, part of her understood that she couldn’t leave these three people. That they were somehow her only salvation. How could that be? She’d never even met them before!
Suddenly, the doctor was next to her, holding a hypo-spray. “You need to sleep, Chelsea. It’s the only way you can get through this. The infection is active again.”
“No more sleep,” she moaned. “Please.”
“Yeah, how about no?” It was the woman with the gold hair. She yanked the hypo from Dr. Copeland’s hand and threw it across the room.
The doctor gaped at the woman. “You can’t be here,” she said icily. “You all need to leave, now, before I’m forced to act.”
“Really?” The guard crossed his arms over his chest. “It’s three against one, as far as I can see.”
“Four against one,” said the Indian, looking his eyes on Chelsea’s. “We’re the only real things in here. The rest of this place is a cortical reality illusion, Chelsea. An incredibly advanced one, yes, but unreal nonetheless. This woman here has been trying to create a scenario in your mind here that you’ll carry with you back into the real world.”
“She wants to wipe your memories and replace them with false ones,” said the young woman. “At the direction of your father.”
“Don’t listen to them!” Dr. Copeland yelled, her voice on the edge of a shriek. “They’re lying to you!”
“I think we’ve had enough out of you,” said the guard. He reached into his suit jacket and withdrew a pistol. “I’m not exactly sure what this will do here, but I’m willing to bet it’s not good.”
The doctor’s purple eyes flashed. “I will not let you ruin this,” she growled.
“I don’t see that you have a choice,” said the Indian.
Chelsea’s mind was scrambling, but at the same time she felt a sense of rightness inside her that she hadn’t experienced in so long. She trusted these people; without knowing why, she still somehow knew
that they were here to help, and that Dr. Copeland wasn’t. Chelsea realized now that she had suspected as much all along, but she’d never had control over her thoughts long enough to properly understand that.
“Maybe we should let the police sort it out,” she said.
“No, I think we’ll force this bitch to get us out of here,” said the young woman. “And I mean right fucking now.”
Dr. Copeland’s stare turned vicious, and suddenly even the man with the gun looked worried.
“What?” the Indian asked, though no one had spoken to him. “Oh, shit. Shit! I didn’t even realize!”
“What are you talking about?” the woman asked warily.
“Sloane said the doctor must be in this reality if she’s able to do everything she’s doing.” He sounded worried. “I don’t know how, but she’s directly linked to this reality.”
“What does that mean?” asked Chelsea. “I don’t understand!”
“It means I have control.” Dr. Copeland sounded triumphant.
“That doesn’t sound good,” said the guard.
Chelsea looked around the room and realized that all the guests had turned their attention toward them. The upper society folks who had just minutes ago seemed so jovial and relaxed now looked angry and menacing, like an army about to face the enemy. They slowly began to close a circle around her and the rest of the group in the center of the room.
“Stop!” she cried. “What are you all doing?”
“It’s a hallucination, Chelsea,” the doctor said softly. “Don’t worry, it will be over soon. The guests are just a symbol of your immune system; they’re trying to fight the worms.”
“Worms?” The young woman sounded offended. “Did she just call us worms?”
She and the other two formed a circle of their own, facing out against the encroaching guests and adopting fighting postures. Suddenly a group of white-haired people in formal wear were attacking, clutching at the three with blue-veined hands and throwing punches that were landing with devastating effectiveness.
“We’re getting beat up by old people!” the young woman shouted, blocking a blow and driving her own fist into the face of geriatric woman in a silver cocktail gown. “That is not cool!”
Chelsea felt on the verge of a breakdown as the scene unfolded. Her heart was telling her to help these new people, but her brain was telling her it was just another hallucination. She cringed as the Indian man took a wing-tipped shoe to the groin from the Carver man she’d been chatting with so easily earlier. It was savage enough to make the young man drop to all fours on the floor, and it make Chelsea sick at heart to see it.
“Can you see me?” asked a voice from beside her.
She jumped at the sound and turned to see a tall young man peering at her curiously, apparently oblivious to the melee going on around them.
“Y-yes,” she stammered.
He nodded. “That’s good. I wasn’t sure this would work, but I had to do something. Things are getting out of hand here.”
The man walked straight into the middle of the fight and was completely ignored by the combatants. But Chelsea noticed that Dr. Copeland, on the far side, apparently could see him, and she didn’t look happy about it.
“Who are you?” she snapped, her voice bordering on panic.
“It’s over,” said the man. He raised his hand and the crowd froze like statues, leaving only the three people in the middle, panting and trying to scramble into a defensive circle again.
“What’s happening?” asked Chelsea.
“You’re asking us?” The man with the dreadlocks was blinking and swaying on his feet. “This is your dream.”
Dr. Copeland’s eyes darted around the room like startled animals. To Chelsea, she seemed to be looking for an escape, or perhaps a weapon.
“You won’t find anything,” said the new arrival calmly. “I’ve taken control.”
“That’s impossible!” the doctor screamed, her beautiful face twisting into a mask of rage. “This is my reality!”
“No need to be unreasonable.”
“What the hell?” the Indian man huffed, his hands propped against his knees. Blood appeared to be dripping from his mouth. “Sloane, is that you?”
Suddenly the man transformed into a cartoon rabbit carrying a carrot. “You were expecting maybe the Easter bunny?” it said in an exaggerated Brooklyn accent before turning back into the man again.
“That’s it,” Chelsea said quietly, shaking her head. “I’m insane. Might as well not try to fight it anymore. It just makes me tired.”
“You’re not insane,” said the man, appearing once again at her side. “This woman here has been trying to brainwash you into believing something that’s not true. She’s been drugging you in conjunction with advanced cortical reality technology to implant thoughts and memories in your mind while trying to make you believe they were your own. Apparently you’ve fought valiantly against it, because you’re standing here. If she had succeeded, we wouldn’t have been able to reach you. In fact, I doubt you would have even perceived us.”
Chelsea felt a sense of warmth inside that was in stark contrast with the confusion that was running through her mind. Her head was telling her she was crazy, but her heart was telling her she was safe somehow. It made no sense and she didn’t care.
“I recognize you all,” she said. “I don’t know how, but I do. You’re my friends. My real friends.”
“No.” The doctor’s voice was lower now, but Chelsea thought that made her sound even more dangerous. “I will not allow this. I didn’t work this hard for this long for this to fall apart now.”
“You have no choice,” said the man. “It’s over. You’re out of options.”
Dr. Copeland glanced to her left at the floor-to-ceiling window that looked out over the San Francisco Bay, and a twisted grin spread over her face. If Chelsea’s memory had been working, she would have thought it reminded her of Senpai Sally.
“Except one,” said the doctor.
With that, she pivoted and sprinted toward the window some twenty meters away, dodging the frozen party guests. Chelsea’s friends took off to follow, but the new man told them to stop. When the doctor was about two meters from the glass, she launched herself into it. In reality, she would have simply slammed into the unbreakable polycarbonate and bounced off, possibly breaking a bone or two in the process. But here, the window shattered into a million pieces, raining into the room like diamonds in the light streaming down from the ceiling above.
And just as it happened, Chelsea saw that the view outside the window was no longer the bay—it was the face of the other man, filling the entire sky.
Then the universe became an empty void.
22
“You son of a bitch.”
Before Quinn knew what was happening, King’s fingers were around his throat and squeezing with as much effort as the man could muster, given the fact his muscles had been frozen for two years and thawed less than an hour earlier. It was still alarming, and Quinn had to struggle to keep from choking.
Bishop and Han flanked the chair and each grabbed an arm to pull King off of Quinn.
“Where am I?” King growled. “Where have you kidnapped me to?”
“Sir,” Quinn said calmly, motioning for the others to let him go. “What’s the last thing you remember before waking up here?”
King’s eyes wandered, unfocused. “We were in Astana, at the break in the vactrain line. Someone… someone ambushed us. A chopper came down, a firefight…”
“Good, good. That’s right. Then what?”
He blinked, confused, and stared as if trying to see into his own memory.
“There was another you,” he said warily. “In the chopper. He—I mean you—grabbed me and threw me inside. I looked down on you and your men, but then I looked up and…. It was your face again.” He shook his head. “I can’t be remembering that right.”
Quinn let out a sigh. This was going to be difficult, and the w
hole situation was giving him a renewed hatred for Zero. Of all the things the bastard had done, Quinn thought that making them believe he was King was by far the most unforgivable. Here, confronted with the real thing, he felt that even more keenly.
“You are remembering right, sir.”
“What? How can that be?”
Quinn gave him the condensed version of what had happened in Astana, and that someone hired by Drake and using Quinn’s face had set them up for the kidnapping. He didn’t mention Zero specifically, and he certainly didn’t tell King they were currently working for him.
“Two years,” King breathed once Quinn had finished. “In cryo-sleep.”
“Yessir. I know that’s a lot to take in.”
King nodded and looked up at the two next to her chair. “You I recognize,” he said.
Bishop tilted his head. “Lt. Bishop, sir.”
“And you?” he asked, turning to Han.
“Marcie Han,” said Quinn. “She was in our unit, but wasn’t part of the mission.”
She bowed her head. “It’s an honor, sir.”
“And you. So, let me get this straight: I’m in Moscow, and we need to somehow escape from this room here and get to the vactrain station?”
“In a nutshell, yes.”
“So we’re practically retracing the mission that we were on before all of this happened. In essence, nothing has changed for me, except I’ve been moved east a bit, from Berlin to Moscow, and starting things all over again.”
Quinn allowed himself a chuckle. “I guess you could say that.”
“Déjà vu all over again,” King sighed.
“We tend to experience that a lot.” Quinn turned to Bishop. “Did you see any other way out from this floor in your recon?”
“None. We have to get back down to the party level and exit the same way we came in.”
“And pray that we don’t get hit with that infrasonic security system that Alina described on our way out,” said Han.
“Alina would have warned us if that were the case.” Quinn turned back to King. “Are you up for walking, sir?”
