by Red Harvey
“Is he canceling?”
“No. I can upload the correct address to your interface. It’s a few minutes away.”
“Go ahead.” Her interface lit up to confirm a successful upload. “Got it.”
She left out the part about the upload being unnecessary. There were only two other addresses listed under the Congressman’s name, and one was in France.
“You’re quite welcome,” replied the assistant, even though Ada didn’t say thank you.
She ended the call.
“New destination. Shall we proceed?”
“Proceed.”
Moretz was planning something. Was her cover still intact? Or had he recognized the face of his child aged into the face of an adult? If so, it was odd he would still want to meet.
She considered returning to the hotel to regroup, but she didn’t want to miss her chance. He wouldn’t take another meeting if she was a no-show tonight. She had no other choice but to follow the yellow brick road.
~*~
“Yes, I appreciate the information. My assistant re-directed her to have dinner here at the main house. Yes, I know what could have happened. Good thing your man has an eye on her.”
Brontes’s phone conversation began to bore Chancelin. Her husband was always talking to someone, and it was always important. Being ignored was a side effect of being married to a powerful man. Her mother, married to a state ambassador, had taught her that.
Chancelin left her husband’s study to find her children. Darcy and Phennell were in the game room. She could hear the ruckus of multiple wall panels from the hallway. The children laughed and grunted in exertion. When Chancelin entered the game room, they were diving in different directions in an effort to divert a holographic tennis ball.
“Get it!” Darcy squealed.
Phennell tapped the pixilated sphere headed toward him. The ball flew past, and a mock crowd cheered. His brows came together.
“What? How’d you do that? Nobody could make that shot.” He rapped his knuckles on the panel. “This thing is glitching again.”
She smiled and bowed. “Nothing glitched, stepbrother.”
“Then why were the panels flickering, stepsister?” he mocked.
“Quite finished?” Chancelin’s frosty remark failed in deterring Phennell’s spirit, but it visibly dampened Darcy’s mood.
“We’re done,” she said, dropping her faux tennis racquet to the floor, which subsequently shattered, its energy absorbed back into the walls.
Phennell changed the subject. “Good thing you got her those lessons, Mom. Otherwise, little Darcy wouldn’t be moving on to the 11th grade.”
Darcy scoffed. “Why should tennis class dictate if I pass in school anyway? I have an A in English and Biomechanics, not that anybody cares.”
“Sports come first in education. That’s the way things have always been.” Chancelin repeated the doctrine told to her since she was in school.
“Na-uh. My English teacher said electives like her class used to be core classes. Even math and history were core classes.” Darcy wrinkled her nose.
“You’ll believe anything, dork. Just listen to the interface screens, not your teachers.” Phennell gave her a playful shove.
She laughed and ran after him. “Mom, tell him to stop!”
“Young lady, it’s you who should stop.”
Darcy’s smile slipped. “Why?”
“Because you need to act appropriately.”
She pointed after her brother, who slipped out of the room to escape the brewing argument. “He shoved me, and you didn’t say anything.”
“Boys are allowed to roughhouse.”
“Why?”
Chancelin knew the reasoning to be sound. During Prominent party meetings, members informed her as such.
“Because I said so.” In a darker tone, she said, “Also, cheating is beneath you. Don’t let it happen again.”
“I didn’t cheat! Pennell’s just a sore loser!”
Her daughter seemed to be telling the truth, which meant Chancelin had a far bigger problem with her than cheating. Phennell was right: no one could’ve made that shot, not unless they were special.
“The panels are not a toy for children. You’re not allowed in here until next school term, when you know how to handle yourself.” She gently pushed a protesting Darcy out of the room. “Get dressed for dinner. And Phennell, put on a damn tie for once,” she called to him.
“Of course, Mother!” His yell echoed down the stairs.
To the panels recreating a cheering crowd behind her, Chancelin said, “Simulation end.”
“Shutting down.”
All four panels went dark.
~*~
Ada wished she had lied to the guard at the front gate. When he asked if her car was electric, she nodded. He directed her to park in the sub-garage.
Before she could ask what a sub-garage was, the guard pressed a button from inside his glass booth. The wrought-iron gates to the Moretz estate opened.
At least a mile beyond the gated entrance, the mansion waited. The gate guard was one of many. She counted ten guards along the entrances and one mercenary bot by the front door. The bot was a smaller and cheaper version than the ones at the government building, but she suspected the intense coding in it would be the same. So much for my quick getaway.
On the winding driveway, the ground opened. Ada pumped the brakes, thinking a natural disaster was responsible. The concrete yawned to create a paved slope with a large overhang. No crumbling earth or residual vibration from an earthquake. The guard had mentioned a sub-garage, and he had meant an underground garage.
Inside the sub-garage were at least a dozen other vehicles, older and newer models, all of them shining to a ridiculous degree. She parked in an empty row behind the model cars, not surprised at the lack of an outlet for electric cars. Moretz was a Prominent Party member. He would be abjured if the public learned he possessed liberal tech. She could see why the guard inquired about her car; Moretz couldn’t even chance having an electric car being seen in the driveway.
“Closing door.” A computerized voice echoed throughout the sub-garage.
The concrete slope moved upward, making a grinding noise of stone on stone as it went. Moonlight disappeared, leaving her in the harsh glow of incandescent light.
She was in trouble. Making a clear escape with her car trapped in a sub-garage would be that much harder.
Damn Prominent tech.
Fifteen
Dinner. Witnesses. No, not witnesses. His family.
They looked picture perfect too. Ada wondered if they knew what a sick man their patriarch could be. Probably not.
During dinner, Moretz’s wife wouldn’t take her gaze off Ada. Phennell was another family member who stared at her during dinner. Although, his stares were full of winks and smiles she couldn’t reciprocate.
Darcy was sweet, and the only Moretz who treated Ada like a person. She liked the teen instantly. She’d never had a sibling. Now she gained two siblings in one day, a staggering thought.
Moretz sprinkled bits of small talk in between nudging her to flirt with his son. They would discuss business later in private, but she wanted him to stop playing matchmaker. After his fifth comment about their compatibility, she almost stood up to say, “He’s my brother.”
Her fantasy distracted her from Phennell who tapped her shoulder. He was one Prominent who didn’t mind touching strangers.
“Yes?”
“I asked where you went to college,” he said.
“Oh.” Ada collected her pre-fabricated answers. “The University of Iowa.”
“Ah, Liberal country!” Moretz said. “Yes, and thank god I escaped.”
Everyone chuckled.
When the laughter tapered, Moretz said, “I thought you had more of a Mid-Western accent.”
“Everyone north of the Mason-Dixon Line sounds the same to you southerners.” She added a cute twang to her words.
More chu
ckles. She began to sweat for the first time at the Moretz dinner table.
Her father pressed again. “Maybe, but I’m a Mid-Westerner myself, so I have more of an ear for it.” A slight silence dragged out before he added, “Of course, even congressmen can be wrong.”
Chancelin and Darcy tittered uncomfortably.
Phennell broke the tenseness by lifting his wine glass. “To Dad admitting he’s human.”
“Phennell,” Chancelin chastised.
“Hear, hear!” Moretz raised his glass, and Darcy and Ada did the same.
Just then, two guards came into the room. Moretz seemed annoyed at the interruption, until he saw the burden they were dragging: a young girl, no more than Darcy’s age. She wore dark clothes, and her young face was smudged with black paint. Obviously, no part of her costume was helpful in concealing her from Moretz’s many guards. No doubt the girl had been caught when she went near the mercenary bot.
Instead of being shamed upon discovery, she stared down each person seated at the dinner table. When it came time for her to glare at Ada, she grinned. Instinctively, Ada nearly returned the gesture, but Mali held her back.
“Look at your plates!” the girl spat.
Darcy alone submitted to the girl’s command.
“You could feed a dozen people. Bet you’re gonna throw it away, huh?” No one answered her. “Ready for dessert now, shitheads?”
Moretz ignored her to address one of his guards. “What was she doing?”
The guard struggled to hold the girl, even though she was half his size. Panting, he said, “We caught her trying to come in through the servant’s entrance.”
“You de-coded the lock?” Ada allowed the shock to color her voice.
The girl rolled her eyes. “It was simple.”
Chancelin gave Ada a reproachful glance, as if questioning the girl was rude.
“She had the passkey on her interface, sir.”
The guard passed Moretz a battered piece of tech. He stared at it, and for a moment, Ada was sure he wanted to smash it against the wall. The moment went by, and he smiled.
“I’m going to keep this for evidence, young lady. Although I’m required to by law, I will hold off on reporting this incident—give you a chance to seek Amnesty on your own. Take her away so I can enjoy dessert with my family.”
“Fucker.”
If her word choice wasn’t saucy enough, the girl spit on the floor. Chancelin squeaked in disgust, while Phennell laughed. Ada held in a reaction. She was worried any of her responses might give away her true allegiances. The girl reminded her of herself, almost like the guards had dragged her in, and she was looking into a younger mirror. Did she want to end up as desperate, as pathetic, and as proud? Yes, she thought she might.
“We’ll come back for you!” The girl’s threat echoed down the hall as she was dragged away. “We’ll get what we came for!”
“Let’s finish our coffee, then we can take our dessert into the sitting room.” Chancelin remained the staid host.
Everyone tried to pretend like what had just happened hadn’t happened. It wasn’t easy, but the offer of dessert helped.
Coffee and dessert were far from the way she imagined the night ending. There was supposed to be blood, screaming, begging, then silence. The sound of her dream dying out was a painful echo in her head.
“Actually, I’m not feeling too hot. I think I’m gonna head out,” she said.
The Moretz clan did everything they could to convince her to stay.
“No, sorry, I need to go.” Ada lied herself away with a headache.
Moretz looked genuinely disappointed. Chancelin led Ada back to the sub-garage. “Dear, I’m sorry you’re not feeling well.”
Her accent made it sound like wail. She looked anything but sorry.
Neither of them mentioned the unknown girl and her attempt at breaking in. However, she decided to try.
“What was that girl after?”
Chancelin’s face underwent a change. A shield came down, and it hardened her already stony features.
“I imagine she planned on kidnapping my husband.”
Kidnapping rich Prominents. A profitable business for some.
There was a crazy period after August’s death in which Ada considered taking it up, but she decided to pursue other interests. And look where it got me.
“Surely they have kidnappings in, where was it, Indiana?”
Ada chuckled at the cute attempt at tripping her up.
“Iowa, ma’am. We have kidnappings, but I’ve never seen one like that. And never first-hand.”
Chancelin’s smile displayed a lot of teeth and very little sweet. “Welcome to Atlanta.”
Ada promised to return to the Moretz home another night, but she didn’t know if she wanted to. He was nearly as perceptive as his wife, which was why Ada chose to leave rather than confront him. Left alone again, she would most assuredly kill him. Tonight was the wrong night for homicide. A full house encumbered her escape plan.
As she left, she considered whether she could still go through with the murder. Moretz wasn’t the bum she’d been expecting to find. His new occupation made it harder to remember the monster he was underneath. And could she rob her brother and sister of their father? Could she force them to live her life, going on missing a part of themselves? The loss of August had ripped at her, and she hesitated to visit such pain on others.
August’s face changed her mind. Yes, he was dead, but it had been his fault. He never told her, never told her what she could be capable of.
Moretz had been too busy feeling up little girls and inhaling blow to be a dependable father. For those reasons combined, she thought she still had the right type of anger to fry him. She couldn’t do it alone. The only person who could help her she had pushed away. Still, she hoped he’d be willing to be an accomplice once more.
~ * ~
In the parking garage of Kressick’s building, Ada plugged her car in to re-charge.
A Sammie approached and tapped her on the shoulder. She straightened and turned. Considering the Prominent aversion to physical contact, even a tap on the shoulder amounted to a near threat.
“Yes?”
“I.D. please.” Ada knew better than to ask why she was being randomly targeted. Rumors floated around about Sammies macing those who asked questions. Progressive as Atlanta was, the Stop and Search Law remained in effect. Stop and Search allowed Sammies to frisk any joe-schmoe they saw strolling along the street, without cause. As a Puerto Rican woman, Ada was used to the suspicion.
She opened her left eye wide. The Sammie passed the I.D. scan device over her retina. The scan brought up Ada’s identity info on the device, but the Sammie didn’t appear satisfied with her credentials.
“It says here you live in Colorado, Tramp. What are you doing in Atlanta?”
“Vacationing.”
“Why?”
She feigned boredom. “I answered this sort of inquiry for the border police.”
“You must answer all police questions, by law.” To drive his point home, the officer put his hand on his pistol, which she noticed was standard laser issue.
“Since you asked, I needed to get away from home after the death of my husband.”
“Your info says he died almost six months ago.” Obviously, the Sammie wasn’t one to miss details.
She suppressed the urge to hit the idiot. “For two months, I was a hermit crab. I didn’t want to go anywhere, understand?”
The cop’s blank stare said he didn’t. “My friend dragged me out of the house to stay at his townhome here in Atlanta. I’m going up to see him now.”
“Name?”
She sighed. “Kressick Lyman, a Prominent.”
Sherlock Holmes narrowed his eyes. An irrational panic raged inside her chest, choking her.
God, does he know? He knows I stole that money, he knows about my trip to the clinic ten years ago.
Damn o-planes, always watching.
; She readied a hand behind her back, blue sparks licking out from her fingertips.
But he said, “Go on then, Citizen.”
The power surge faded within her.
Exhaling a sigh of relief, she walked to the dissipating elevator doors, carefully glancing behind her. The Sammie was leaving. In the aftermath, she still felt poked and prodded with his questions. He had probably kept on after reading her religious— none—and political affiliations—Tramp.
Atlanta was a modern metropolis with more of an open-mind than Ada was used to encountering in Colorado, but the Prominent arm fell heavily here, like everywhere. The Stop and Search could have resulted from tech profiling, most notably profiling citizens who drove electric cars. Either that or Moretz sent a goon out to scare her.
Both possibilities made her angry, and she liked the anger. Anger put her in the place where she needed to be. The place where murdering her father felt as pleasurable as resetting the programming on a knobby interface.
Sixteen
Kressick knew if he remained patient, she would realize his help was invaluable. Ada was a person to be approached cautiously. She was sensitive about being helpless. After what she’d gone through, Kressick could sympathize with the feeling. However, her abilities made her far from helpless.
Every day, she perfected her skills, learned new talents. He had seen some of her power usages posing as her mother’s boyfriend. Lately, Shylar’s reports kept him abreast of any developments in Ada’s life. The newest thing Kressick heard from Shylar was her ability to levitate metal objects.
While observing through her hotel window, he’d seen her put both hands on either side of a metal paper weight. She emitted an electrical field, causing the paper weight to hover.
Kressick was impressed. After learning of her new trick, he assumed a stoic face in front of Shylar. In truth, Kressick was fascinated with, and scared of, her. He couldn’t wait to see what else she was capable of.
His contact was also interested in her new abilities. He would be even more interested to know she wanted help for a second time.
The doorbell signaled her arrival. Kressick smiled and deactivated his wristlet. Updating his contact could wait until later. “Door open.”
