by Taya DeVere
White coat.
White shoes.
White pill.
Kaarina stops kicking and lets herself float slowly downward again. She closes her eyes when the images of her mother’s lifeless face rush in.
“She murdered my mother…” she whispers.
“What’s that?” the nasal voice asks with a hint of surprise.
“Solomon. She gave my mother a pill. Must have lied about what it would do to her. My mother never left me. She was taken from me.”
For a moment, the line stays quiet. Kaarina floats in the water, not sinking but not kicking for the surface either.
“I see.” Nurse Saarinen clears her throat. “And who told you this?”
“Miranda.”
“Who?”
“My mother’s Home-Helper.”
“Aha.” Nurse Saarinen seems to hesitate with her words. “And what else did you learn about your mother’s last moments?”
“Only the last two hours or so. The security feed wouldn’t rewind or forward.”
“I see,” Nurse Saarinen repeats, a hint of satisfaction or relief in her voice. “Well, Laura is known to dispense with those who question her vision. Unfortunately, your mother was such a person. Maija was quite pleasant. I remember her well.”
“You do?”
“Yes. We worked together for years at the hospital, until The Great Affliction.”
Kaarina wiggles her feet, then circles her hands to move toward the ice ceiling. She doesn’t care if Nurse Saarinen worked with her mother. Whether she thinks she was a good person or not. All Kaarina really cares about is…
“I want her to pay.”
“And who is that?” Nurse Saarinen asks slowly. “Laura?”
“Yes.” Kaarina kicks hard with her legs and takes a few strokes to reach the hole in the ice. She floats just beneath the surface, then pulls herself back up. Soaking wet, she isn’t shivering. Focused is all she feels. The hatred she feels now more than ever before presses against her chest, then travels up her throat, finally fills her whole being. “I want her to suffer.”
“Well…” Nurse Saarinen’s tone of voice warms with pleasure. This time, instead of a shrug, Kaarina can sense a smug smile take over her face. “It just so happens… that’s why I’m calling.”
***
14
IRIS
December 2089
City of England
CHAPTER 1 — TEA FOR THE DECHIPPED
Her steps slow as she nears the punching bag. Feet shoulder-distance apart and staggered with one foot in front of the other, Iris narrows her eyes and imagines the bag to be flesh and bones—filled with ill intentions. A sack of filth wrapped in the shape of a man.
She raises her hands, positions them like she’s prepared to punch. She throws two punches in quick succession, first jabbing with her left arm, then crossing with her right. After a quick duck, she repeats the jab-cross-squat sequence. Lost in flow, she skips the squats, punching the bag with all she has. Left, right. Left, right. Dripping sweat, tears burning her squinting eyes, Iris stares at the sack of meat, imagining a face she only allows herself to remember when she’s training.
Jab-cross. Jab-cross. Out of breath, completely focused, Iris nearly misses the gym door clicking open behind her. Soft steps across the floor don’t interrupt her perfect focus. She squats down, jumps right back up again, and punches the bag with more force.
Her forearms are burning. Tears fill her narrowed eyes, but Iris doesn’t stop. Not even when the old woman circles the punching bag and stands quietly at a safe distance.
Jab-cross-knee.
Jab-cross-round.
Jab-rear hook-front hook.
Hook-hook-upper-upper.
Front-kick-jab-cross.
Jab-cross-jab-knee.
Her thighs go numb. It’s only been a few hours since Iris last visited the gym—for this very reason. Obsessive or not, it’s better this way. No matter how many times the doctors tell her to refrain from exercise for seven to ten days after her dechipping operation.
Jab-jab-cross-cross-squat.
“How about a break, dear?”
Jab-jab-jab. Iris shuffles and moves around the punching bag. The old woman, holding something steaming in her hands, now stands behind her back.
“I’m not telling you to stop…”
Jab-cross. Jab-cross.
“But I made tea. Icelandic moss.”
A quick squat down leaves Iris kneeling on the floor. Out of breath, her legs numb and powerless, she pants, wiping her forehead on the back of her arm. She doesn’t answer Mrs. Salonen or glance up to send a nasty look in her general direction.
Leave me the fuck alone, she thinks, but bites her tongue. It’s only been a few hours since she last tortured her body with an extended kickboxing session, and it’s only been two hours since Iris last snapped and yelled at the woman—for interrupting her practice to tell her the sauna was heated and ready.
She hears Mrs. Salonen approach her with careful steps. Iris leans back and sits on the floor with her legs spread, tossing her head back to move the blue and white lock of hair off her face. When Mrs. Salonen kneels down and sits in front of her, Iris doesn’t tell her to leave. After placing a tray with two steaming mugs of tea between them, Mrs. Salonen winces and tries to find a better position on the hard floor. For a woman her age—and with her bad hip—the gym’s cold floor is the last place she should sit for a cup of tea. Guilt nags at Iris, but with a quick shake of her head, she refuses to listen to it.
She never invited Mrs. Salonen to come here. Just like I didn’t ask her to make me moss fucking tea.
Her eyes soft and friendly, Mrs. Salonen brings her tea close to her face, then blows into the mug, supporting her hip with her free arm. “Laura was asking about you today,” she says matter-of-factly. “It’s been a while since the two of you talked.”
“Yeah, well,” Iris says with a scoff, staring at her mug on the floor. Instead of reaching for the moss tea, she looks around to find her sports drink bottle, but she must have forgotten to bring it from the locker room. “Speaking with the dead isn’t really my cup of… tea.” She gives Mrs. Salonen a quick look but doesn’t return her amused smile. “Pun not intended,” she adds, murmuring.
“Laura had some news…” the old woman says, her voice more careful than before. “It’s about Iceland.”
A sharp, cutting pain passes through Iris’s stomach, but she doesn’t let on. She’s stronger than that—with or without a chip in her brain. Revealing pain is a vulnerability. A soft spot. Being vulnerable is the biggest no-no. If Laura Solomon taught Iris anything, that would be it. “Let me guess,” she says. “Nurse Saarinen finally pulled the trigger. Or pushed a button. Whatever.”
Mrs. Salonen nods. “I’m afraid so.”
“It’s all gone?” Iris says, staring over the old woman’s shoulder, focusing on fighting the burning sensation at the back of her eyes. “The resort. The village. The barns. All of it?”
Just like my chip, she thinks but doesn’t say that part aloud. The only thing that made me special. Worthy of Laura’s attention.
After a small sigh, Mrs. Salonen pauses and focuses on stirring her tea. Again, she blows into the cup carefully, places her palm on top of the steam, then lowers the cup back down to the floor. “How’s your head, dear?”
“Still fucking attached.”
A small twitch at the corner of the old woman’s lips tells Iris what she already knows; she isn’t bothered by Iris’s angst. “I understand,” Mrs. Salonen says, tilting her head in a motherly way. “It is such a big change. You need time to adjust.”
“I don’t need shit. I told you, I’ll deal with the storage pods. I’ll integrate the ICE test subjects with their new fucking coffins.”
Iris swallows as mental images of stasis capsules and white long-storage pods flash through her mind’s eye. Staring at the elevator door is the closest she’s gotten to working on organizing the massive p
od farm downstairs.
“I see,” Mrs. Salonen says. She tilts her head to the other side. “And when is this happening?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Ahh,” Mrs. Salonen says, her lip twitching as she takes a careful sip of her tea. “Tomorrow it is, then.”
“And what is that supposed to mean?”
“What, dear?”
Iris narrows her eyes at the old woman. “You’re not even going to bitch at me… are you?”
The woman shakes her head no. With a small smile, she reaches for her mug on the floor. “If you say you’ll come back to work tomorrow…” She pauses for a careful sip of tea. “Tomorrow it is.”
“Whatever.”
Iris has been telling Mrs. Salonen she’d deal with what awaits downstairs “tomorrow” for what must be seven or eight weeks now, ever since the shipment of stasis capsules from Iceland arrived. All along, they knew Nurse Saarinen would destroy the resort in Iceland. Grudgingly, Iris had finally agreed to pack her few belongings, gather the resort’s animals for transport, and leave her home country with Mrs. Salonen to relocate to a safer place—City of England—where they’d continue the fight against Nurse Saarinen and the Happiness-Program.
But the thought of doing the work without being chipped is nauseating. Every time Iris walks to the elevator to travel down to the basement, her world starts spinning. Her breath becomes shallow. A tinny sound takes over her ears. For the first time in years, she feels weak again. So she keeps turning around, heading back to the gym or the Chip-Center’s roof to gasp for fresh air.
After burning her tongue when going for a sip of tea, Iris sets the mug on the floor and stands up hastily. The room spins around her, forcing her to freeze and rebalance. Once her brain adjusts after the sudden movement, she steps away from Mrs. Salonen and turns her back on her, facing the bag. As Iris lands the first punch, she hears Mrs. Salonen arranging the tea mugs on the tray, then struggling up from the floor. Iris wonders if the old woman secretly wishes that her stasis capsule’s healing properties would have been turned on, back when Iris and Laura cornered her and shoved her in her Icelandic prison years ago. But somehow, Iris knows healing and improving Mrs. Salonen while storing her away would have made her even more upset. It’s bad enough that her own daughter shoved her in a capsule, at least Laura had honored her mother’s wishes against being rejuvenated. Keeping her gaze on the bag’s torn leather, Iris tries to ignore the woman as she walks over and sets something on the floor next to Iris.
“I’ll see you tomorrow, dear.”
Soon, a loud click fills the room as Mrs. Salonen closes the gym door behind her.
Jab-jab-cross-cross-squat.
Iris shakes her head, trying to lose the image of endless rows of smooth-surfaced pod capsules bathe in an eerie red light. Millions and millions of people, forgotten, turned off, abandoned, underneath City of England. Research labs and storage spaces are all that is left of City of England today. Though Nurse Saarinen is in charge of it all, she has no idea that Mrs. Salonen and Iris have taken over the Chip-Center, quietly doing research of their own. Saarinen now seems to operate exclusively from her bunker in City of Spain, hiding in plain sight, leaving places like City of England abandoned and out of use.
Jab-cross-squat.
When Iris tries to come back up from her squat, her legs give out. She falls on her ass on the floor, then lets her upper body go limp. Chest heaving, she moves into a fetal position and rests her hollow-feeling head against her arm. Iris’s face feels hot as the agitation washes over her body.
Why is the old woman so good to me? Why can’t she just scream at me? Tell me what a piece of shit I am?
She should spit in Iris’s face. She should lock her away in one of the glass boxes down in the labs. Tase her. Slap her. She should send her to the United Inland, abandon her to survive on her own.
But no. No, no, no. Not Mrs. Salonen. Her softness and understanding are a trigger for Iris, though she’s unsure why. It makes her want to scream. Kick. Stab. Not everyone deserves a second chance. Some people should be stored away in one of those hell-pods, without a release date.
People like Iris.
She gets up from the floor, her thighs numb and calves threateningly wobbly. She brushes her shredded knuckles against the bag. Still slightly out of breath, she leans in and wraps her arm around it, balancing herself against the bag’s shaky support. Like a lousy parent, the bag keeps Iris standing, but just barely. Any moment now, she could fall. Any moment now, the bag could snap from the hook on the ceiling, come crashing down on Iris. Any moment now, this false security the bag is giving her could disappear, kicking her legs out from underneath her.
Let it, she thinks. What else is new?
It wouldn’t be the first time that something that was supposed to support and protect her turned against Iris and ruined her soul.
CHAPTER 2 — THE ALGORITHM
(5 YEARS EARLIER)
“Let go of the inside rein!” The sound of his agitated voice fills the enormous indoor arena. Her own intermittent breath in her ears, Iris moves her right hand forward toward the horse’s wither. She activates her lower stomach muscles, trying to find movement within the horse’s movement.
“You’re doing it again!” the man yells from the corner of the riding arena. “Let go,” he pauses for emphasis, “of the fucking rein!”
Sweat drips from under Iris’s riding helmet. It’s minus twenty Celsius outside, but riding in the indoor arena feels like a swim in one of the hot water springs surrounding this barn she lives and works in.
“Okay, stop. Stop, stop, stop.”
Iris bears down on her seat and closes her fists on the reins. The gelding stops, his nostrils puffing and his neck foaming. Just like Iris, the horse has been going on fumes for the last thirty minutes—when the training session should have ended but didn’t. She reaches for the gelding’s withers and scratches slightly, then pulls her hand quickly away, cursing her mistake in her mind.
Her trainer’s shiny dressage boots freeze a few meters away on the sand and rubber arena floor. Although Iris doesn’t look over to see Timothy Walker’s wrathful face, she knows his eyes are locked on Iris’s left hand.
“Pat…” he pauses to give Iris a brief, dry laugh. “You patted him? What in the world makes you think he needs to be rewarded right now?”
“Sorry, Mister Walker.” Iris closes her eyes and looks away, again cursing at herself.
“And who the fuck said you could talk back at me? How many trillion times do I need to tell you before you get it through your monkey brain? You. Do. Not. Talk. You sit up there, keep your ass and private parts glued to the saddle, and shut. The fuck. Up. Is that understood?”
Iris holds her breath and gives a small nod. The words spat out by her world-famous trainer echo in the empty arena. It’s six-thirty in the morning. Though the horses are all fed and resting in their run-out paddocks, no other riders are present. Tina’s still sound asleep. It’s just Tim and Iris. And the poor gelding, Romeo, trying to get his breathing under control.
When the fuming man steps closer, Romeo lifts his neck, flashing the white of his eye. His whole seven hundred kilo body goes rigid under Iris’s seat.
“Honestly,” Tim breathes out and crosses his long, slim arms on his chest. “You’ll be eighteen in, what, six fucking days? If you want to make it to the big girl’s league, I need you to start taking this seriously. None of this…” he circles his hand in the air frantically, “this shit-show. Can’t you see your horse is struggling? You sit up there, trying to look all cute and pretty, when in reality you look like a monkey on a fucking stick. Feet sticking out, your hands doing…” He pauses to scoff, “I honestly don’t know what is up with your fucking hands, but your head bobs around like the empty bucket it is. You think I want to be here at six in the morning, watching this… this… joke? Do you?”
Iris shakes her head once. Her cheeks burn, but she’s unsure whether it’s because of p
hysical exhaustion, anger, or embarrassment. Probably a little bit of each.
“That’s right. I don’t. You think I wanted to leave the states and move up here to freeze my balls and watch some mediocre rider hump a mediocre horse day in and day out?”
Iris gasps for air, holds it, and fights the urge to let her mind travel somewhere else, on a mental vessel she created a long, long time ago. Well before Timothy Walker ever set foot in her home country of Iceland.
He spreads his hands, then lets them fall at his side. A loud slap sound fills the indoor arena. Romeo tenses under Iris but stays put, his head turned slightly away from the man next to him. Iris’s hand twitches to scratch the gelding’s neck, but she catches herself before she makes the same mistake twice in a row.
Tim turns around, heading back to his red trainer’s chair in the corner of the arena. Before he sits down, he reaches for a dressage whip, then lifts it above his head and circles it around once. “One more time,” his voice booms in the hall. “And get it fucking done this time.” What follows is just a murmur, but loud enough for Iris to hear as she picks up the right lead counter-canter precisely in the middle of the short side. “Don’t make me send your ass back to whatever igloo or ice hole you first crawled out of.”
***
The numbers run across the computer screen. Her feet throbbing in pain, Iris moves her hips to find a more comfortable position on the hard mattress. The wind blows outside, sending a freezing cold draft across the bedroom. Iris glances at the radiator longingly, then drops her chin in defeat. If she wanted a warmer room, she’d need to pay Timothy for heat. But because all her money goes into training, she can barely make her rent. So the heat from the barn downstairs, where the horses munch their nightly hay, will have to do.
Sighing, she gets up and heads to the small closet by the door. When she opens the closet door and reaches for the extra blanket, a barn spider takes off and disappears into the crack at the back of the upper shelf.
