by Tara Brown
Fireworks burst behind my closed lids, sending signals all over my body and brain. It’s moving fast but I’m able to keep up. With Dr. Jacquard with me I can do anything.
“Holy shit,” Leah whispers somewhere in the background but I can’t see her. I’m finishing the sabotage I’ve planted in the computer system for the last five days.
I’m creating a siren call and uploading it into myself.
When I’m done, my eyes pop open and I smile at the startled expression on Leah’s face. “Let’s do this.”
She flinches. “You look evil.”
“I think I might be,” I agree because what is about to happen next is nothing short of sinister.
“I’m sneaking back out this way.” She points in the opposite direction I am about to walk. “I’ll meet you out there?”
“Okay.” I wave and leave her, indifferent to her survival in this moment. I don't care if any of us makes it.
So long as this ends today, everyone here is fair game.
Chapter 27
The last day
My legs push as I run through the crowds of people in the small town we’ve built. Liam has an army preparing off to the left. No doubt Lee will lead them, meaning they won’t do anything.
When I reach the top of the rampart, Tanya is waiting exactly where I knew she’d be, at the very back of town. Houses have been built up, making a view of this area impossible from the castle. It’s off the ground to protect her from the riders and guards, but also not a spot Liam will see.
“Lou!” She waves.
“You ready for this?” I ask coldly.
“Nope.” She laughs nervously. She’s warm and human and fuzzy still. Her cheeks flush and her eyes dart between the hordes arriving and my face. “You okay?”
“Never better,” I say.
“When this is over, if we make it, we have some serious catching up to do.”
My eyes dart to hers, making her flinch, and I know it’s because they’re glowing as they always do when I get fired up. “I doubt either of us is making it out of this.”
“You really don't feel anything right now, do you? He said you’d be numb, cold, a robot. I told him no way—not you. I said, ‘Lou would never be closed off.’” She takes a step toward me. “But I was wrong.”
“This is what we would become,” I say matter-of-factly, blinking at her. “This is what a full override looks like. The fate of the humans if the bots win. I had to become it to fight it.”
“Then I guess we better stop them.” She scowls and her eyes are flooded with emotions I can’t relate to. They’re there; they’re spilling from her. But I feel nothing.
I offer her a hand.
She hesitates before putting her soft, warm fingers into mine. She hums weirdly. She is similar to me, but she’s also different. The hum is empty, there’s a void within it. I don't like it. It might be the only thing I’m not indifferent to.
She climbs on my back, gripping tightly to my neck. She weighs nothing, and yet she might be the heaviest thing I’ve ever carried. And I don't know why that is.
I turn and scale the rampart, climbing to the ground below, and putting her down. She slips her hand back into mine and we run. We don't have to speak. The plan was formulated with precision and preparation that could only have come from the doctor who helped create these bots. Jacquard knew exactly what they would do. He was able to predict every outcome to a tiny degree of error.
Which means we can predict it too.
The bots work the margins and change the plan ten steps ahead based on every action. They’re moving me and directing me and predicting our next course to ensure the outcome will be a success.
I have Dr. Jacquard in me, taking charge and guiding the way. His life is part of the story too.
I see the moment he met Tanya. When he lied about her to Liam and hid her away with the help of Harold, protecting her and waiting for his chance to strike. She has been the secret weapon in his armory for a long time.
We run to the front lawn where I parked the helicopter that is still there with a cover over it. I grab the cover and pull it off, placing my hand on the helicopter. My bots, the ones stored in here, come to life. The machine fires up its weapons.
Once it’s ready, I stand in the middle of the grass and place Tanya in front of me.
“Lou?” Liam shouts from the castle. “What are you doing?”
Tanya can’t hear him screaming at us but she’s trembling, no doubt from the onslaught of people coming this way. And the fact she is about to destroy everything. Maybe even herself.
“Lou!” he screams.
Ignoring him, I flex my fingers as something random happens. “Seven Nation Army” by the White Stripes begins playing in my mind. Dr. Jacquard loaded it so I would hear it at this exact moment. Even numbed, that makes me smile. But a second later, the music dies as the programming for the siren call, my siren call, kicks in. The footsteps are closer.
The people are everywhere. They’re coming to us.
I part my lips and it escapes me. I open my mouth wider and the sound of my screaming becomes mixed with the siren call. I tilt my head back, let my arms relax out from me, and send the sound into the sky.
The sound waves travel up and dome out, surrounding us all. The tower keeps the sound waves going.
There is no escaping me.
Every bot in North America that is viable is here. Over the last five days, the siren coming from our tower changed, calling whoever could get here and killing off whoever couldn't. Unfortunately, it meant killing off hosts who weren’t sustainable.
The live ones have jumped ship from their sick or slow hosts, crowding live bodies to the point of boiling over. They’ve attached to one another, becoming one. They’ve caught rides on the healthiest hosts, and driven, ridden, and run to get here. They stopped only when necessary and now they’re here, running at us like a wave. Like a scene in a movie.
When the siren finishes leaving my lips, I gasp for air and stand up straight, swallowing the blood from the small rips in my esophagus from screaming so loud.
“Lou!” Liam shouts at me again, he’s closer now. He’s not running. He’s too confident in himself and his bots to run.
I turn, placing my hands behind my back so they’re still touching Tanya, keeping her with me.
“What are you doing?” he asks as he makes his way across the field. “What is the plan here?”
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, knowing he can hear it. Even over the noise of our new guests, he hears it. He thinks he’s walking to me to confront me, but he doesn't realize his bots have been overrun. He’s answering my call.
He’s coming to me because I called him. He’s too confused from fighting his emotions to understand this. Dr. Jacquard knew this would happen too.
“Sorry for what?” He’s so lost. The bots have him convinced betrayal is impossible, though his nature would disagree with this if he was permitted to think on his own.
The helicopter lifts off the ground slightly and turns, facing Liam with the guns ready.
Everything is prepared for war.
But it’s not the war he thinks it is.
The wall of people gets close enough for even Tanya to hear them gasping for air, some struggling to stay alive. They stop, creating a circle around us, stretching a mile out, a funnel of people. They are all inside the dome I have created, a sound wave dome that pulsates the same message on repeat from the towers.
“Lou?” Liam makes his way to the front of the massive crowd, facing me from only a few feet away. He has to shield his eyes from dust as his hair blows in the wind the chopper creates as it hovers just above us. “What are you doing?”
“When Dr. Jacquard found out I could take the bots from others, he and I both assumed it was because I killed them.” I pause, offering him a smirk. “Turns out that was not exactly accurate. The bots would’ve come simply because I called them. The death was unnecessary.”
“Okay
, I don't see how this is pertinent. Or I guess why you killed him then.”
“He made me kill him so there was no chance of failure in this. So you couldn't get your hands on him and discover he was sabotaging you from the very beginning.”
The reality that this is all a trap hits him. “Don't do this.” He isn’t angry yet, but I suspect he’s going to lose the war over his emotions any second. His eyes flicker to the left and the right as he plots.
“I have to. I have to save us all.” I’m detached from this truth, but it rings somewhere deep inside me. It’s important to me. “They want to control us. They want to run everything. We are becoming their slaves. And you can’t see this right now, but it’s the truth.”
Lee, Erin, Miles, Kyle, and Leah make their way to where Tanya and I are.
“Is this because of him?” Liam asks, pointing at Kyle.
“No.”
“Do you love him still?” His eyes narrow and I see the switch in him. He’s losing the war on his rage.
“No,” I answer truthfully. It's all I have. Kyle flinches at my answer and again somewhere within me there is a note of pain or devastation. “I love you. That is the honest truth. I couldn't lie to you right now if I wanted to. The bots running me are Dr. Jacquard’s and they have a single mission. They have closed off all other facets of my being to ensure optimal performance from me.” I take a small step toward him, hoping he sees the gesture in it. “I love you, this body and its heart and soul love you.”
“If you do this, you don't love me.” He goes for manipulation. He can’t help himself.
“You’re wrong. I’m doing this because I love you.”
“Lou!” he snaps. “Do you know what happens to me when the bots are gone? Do you know what I become?”
“A shadow man,” I whisper, not sure why it slips out. It shouldn't have—it shouldn't have made it past the wall.
His eyes widen. His lips part suggesting he wants to say something but he can’t. I’ve hit him with a weapon he didn't know I had in my arsenal.
“And my love will save you from him.” I believe this too. “From your darkness.”
“You can’t,” he whispers back. A single tear slips from one of his eyes. He swallows hard and the emotion shuts off. I see the switch in him. He goes from devastated to psychotic in a single heartbeat. His eyes narrow and he fixates on my friends. He’s choosing which one—which one will stop me.
What he doesn't know is that not one of them will change this.
Not a single one.
Dr. Jacquard has shut me off. I can scream and sob from behind the wall where he trapped my other bots and my personality and soul. But I won’t change my mind, this mind is controlled by something else. It has tunnel vision. One destination, any cost.
He runs at Lee but Erin steps in the way. The fight is on. He punches Erin who stabs him with something in the shoulder. He screams. She rages.
Leah grabs them both, trying to separate them.
He backhands Leah.
Miles grabs him, throwing him into the crowd of live bots who are waiting for their next set of orders from me.
Kyle rushes the crowd, following Liam. They’re both screaming and grunting and attacking. It’s a fight to the death. But I don't move, I don't stop it.
I need the distraction of it.
I need Liam busy.
He’s trapped in there, meaning he can’t stop me.
Ignoring the screaming of my own heartache deep within me, I watch for the second needed to charge my siren call again.
Tanya spins me, her eyes wide with fear. “Do it now!” she shouts over the sound of the chopper.
“I don't know how to say this right now, being so closed off. But I want you to know I love you.”
She nods, losing her hold she has too tight a grip on. Her voice cracks as tears flood her eyes, “I love you too.” Her lip trembles and my old feelings stir, but they can’t save either of us from this.
Dr. Jacquard’s bots have their orders.
I lean in, completely against every emotionless bot in my body, and kiss her forehead. I hover there for a second, then stand up straight and lean back, letting my arms fall at my sides as I part my lips and scream a second siren call.
It’s painful but the bots are repairing the damage to my throat as I unleash the final orders.
The noise of my scream is paralyzing.
It’s a combination request.
It freezes the hosts completely.
Then the bots repair any damage to the body that they can with the limited resources left.
The hosts hold hands.
Once the body is left in a healed state, it will survive on its own. The bots transfer all information to a single nanobot which then crawls from the mouths and along the hands of the group, moving to the front and the vacated host collapses.
As the siren call leaves my body, I grab Tanya and begin the final phase of Dr. Jacquard’s mission.
Her eyes are wide and bloodshot, and I can’t help but stare into them as I lock our hands together.
“Biomagnetism,” I say to her softly.
“What?”
“Dr. Jacquard thought maybe it was some weird kind of biomagnetism. He didn't have time to solve it, but he believed that’s why you’re immune.”
“Cool.” She nods but her eyes are drifting to the left and the right as thousands of saliva-riding bots move their way to us, leaving collapsing people. The helicopter lifts more so and now its soft hum mixes with the grunts and crumpling noises as the host bodies drop to the grass unconscious. Or dead.
The circle of human hosts is dropping like a wave, starting at the back, coming toward us, creating dust that mixes with the helicopter. I walk to where Liam and Kyle stand frozen nearby. Blue lights glow from them as the bots heal the last of the wounds they inflicted on each other.
Kyle’s eyes are closed but Liam’s lids flicker as though his eyes are rolled back in his head. I place both my hands on his cool cheeks and pull his face down to mine. “Come back to me,” I whisper and plant a kiss on him, taking the bots from him directly as they finish their task.
He falls to the ground first, unconscious.
His life spills over into my mind.
Everything I saw in the dream, everything, was accurate.
That breaks a piece of me off deep inside. I’ll feel it later if I survive this.
Silently and without asking for the forgiveness I hope he can one day give me, I grab Kyle’s hand and close my eyes.
It takes several minutes for the bots to move forward and finally enter me.
Lives and stories and flashes of everything hit all at once. A thousand stories come to life. Kyle’s anger at me, his heartbreak and confusion and desperation which could drown me if I was able to feel anything.
I’m buzzing with energy like I could lift off the ground, but I’m also swollen and strained by the amount of memory and bot materials writhing inside. I should burst and spill my guts everywhere, but the bots hold me together. Damaging and healing at the same time.
Pain hits as veins are ruptured and bloody bots spill under my skin. I moan but manage to move forward, pushing myself through it.
I had visions of how this was going to go. How this would work. They’re dead inside me now. The pain is so bad I can barely keep my eyes open. I’m going to die from this overload.
I take Tanya’s hands again as the helicopter lowers so we can board. I can’t step, the bursting veins and splitting skin prevent it. I roll onto my back on the deck of the chopper and lie there as Tanya climbs on. She grabs my hands and drags me, both of us screaming, me from the tearing of my flesh and her from the effort she is putting in.
The helicopter lifts, jostling me as the writhing jelly of nanobots jiggles inside me.
Tanya lies on the floor of the helicopter with me. I stare at the dark ceiling of it, gagging from the strain.
She strokes my head once, a sob slips from her lips, then she leans for
ward, planting her lips on mine. It starts as a kiss but with the last of the energy I have, I send them into her. I command them all.
She sucks and I exhale, sending all the life inside me into her. She’s choking on them as they rush forward to their doom. A fate they couldn't have imagined for themselves. Only a human mind could have come up with this solution, a kiss of death that is dependent upon two humans being oddly affected by the bots. One a weapon and the other a furnace.
Her fingers dig in as the bots enter her, taking up too much space. She decommissions them as they enter her but that doesn't shrink them. They hum but they are lost, their programming is gone. Maybe it’s biomagnetics. Maybe it’s a glitch in her nervous system. Maybe it’s God.
Whatever it is, as the bots ooze into her mouth, carried by my blood or saliva, it drains me, leaving me a mess of destroyed veins and blisters and split skin. I’m not bleeding out onto the deck of the helicopter. She gags and fights, pushing back and wanting to stop.
I muster one last bit of strength, a reserved last push that I saved for this exact moment, and force myself on top of her. I flop there and hold her mouth open with mine and they pour from me. I bleed and ooze into her mouth, forcing her to gulp. I’m killing my friend.
The last of them leave me, I feel it. Her eyes are wide open and she’s glowing bright blue, overwhelmed by the amount of them. But the glow fades as she destroys their programming. She doesn't just reset, she leaves them impotent.
When I’m empty, I collapse onto my back.
The agony of everything hits.
My destroyed body.
Liam.
Kyle.
Lee.
The hurt I’ve caused them all sickens me.
But the fact I will die without seeing Joey chokes me. Her face, and Gus’s flood my mind.
The sun was shining. The day was crisp. But humidity has moved in and now there are storm clouds coming this way. The wind picks up, brushing over my aching skin.
The taste of blood is unbearable. The pain is excruciating.
And somewhere deep inside, a scream is trying to get out, but I don't have anything left in me to let it out.
