by Red Harvey
Shylar couldn’t hear Ada’s exact words from his vantage point. Once again, he turned up the speaker just in time to hear the stranger’s denial: No, she hadn’t been following Ada, of course not.
The woman stopped talking mid-sentence, and an intense shudder shook her body.
Then, she spoke in a small voice. “Yes, I was following you.”
Damn. Ada must’ve changed the woman’s neural pathways to wrestle the truth from her. He noted the override on his arm, and continued watching.
“Who do you work for?” Ada demanded.
“A faction of the Prominents.”
Prominents shadowed citizens all the time. Shylar wasn’t surprised at the woman’s admission. However, he was worried. Following Ada was his job. Had Kressick or Moretz called in for a second opinion?
“Why were you following me?”
The woman’s face betrayed little emotion, and her voice was a monotone drone.
“You’ve been to Congressman Moretz’s home on several occasions. That makes you a POI.”
“Person of interest.” Ada clapped her hands together and smiled.
Realizing fully what the Sammie meant by POI, Shylar was un-entertained. His mission parameters had been preparing him for a government encounter. Instinct screamed for him to haul the Sammie away, but he beat his instinct down. Instinct held no weight with who Shylar had been re-wired to become.
Fortunately, the longer he listened, the more he realized forcibly removing the Sammie had become a non-issue. Ada asked the woman if she was working for or against Moretz. The question drove another shudder through her.
She answered, “neither”.
After that, Ada told her to report back to her superiors: “Ada is not a POI. She is merely the latest girlfriend of Phennell Moretz.”
Much like a robot would, the Sammie turned and marched away. She passed Shylar in his shadowy alcove a block down. Her head turned to him, and her mouth formed the word “hello”, but her eyes remained blank. He imagined she would be on auto-pilot until she delivered Ada’s message. He remembered the after effects of her ability—the feeling of a foreign invader in his mind. And yet, the invader had tricked him, telling him it belonged. The experience was perverse and calming. He pitied the Sammie somewhat.
“Impressive,” he murmured.
When she returned to Kressick’s, she neglected to mention her State-encounter. In her place, Shylar would not have mentioned it either. She had to be deciding if Kressick could still be trusted, given his relationship to her and her father. Shylar knew better on both counts.
He sent Kressick video of the Sammie meeting. Kressick messaged him back with
I hoped against this, but it was anticipated. Now we know.
The virtual conversation could have ended there, but Shylar added a personal question.
What is it exactly that I’m doing for you? Is this a job?
Of course, was Kressick’s next message.
Am I getting paid?
My dear boy, along with your expense account that you dip into daily, you have a separate account that has accrued your salary from day one. If you have not yet accessed that account, I am sure the funds have stacked up to gross amounts.
He could almost hear the bemused British tone in his head as he read the text.
A job. A salary. Shylar had some of his shit together. He needed time to secure the rest of his shit, like a permanent residence—no more hotel rooms—and a car of his own, not one of Kressick’s. All of those things were necessary.
For what?
A deep reservoir within him whispered back, to be worthy.
For whom?
For yourself.
And...
For her.
~ * ~
Ada didn’t disclose her State encounter with anyone. Weeks went by, and she didn’t ask Kressick or Moretz what was what. There was a reason behind her hesitancy. Once she asked her questions, her mission timetable would move up considerably. No more afternoons, or nights, with Phennell. No more of the city she was starting to fall in love with. Once she spoke of the State encounter, my hat’d be over the wall, and there would be no going back.
Her mother’s condition remained unchanged. Ada continued calling Cybil every day, in hopes Gemina had woken. Kressick bothered her for updates, always looking disappointed at the news of her continued coma. Cybil reminded Ada of an upcoming synth payment, which in turn reminded her of the other reason for contacting Moretz.
Through Kressick, she set up an informal lunch between the three of them. His presence was necessary, both to hold her back and to alleviate the tension between father and daughter. Even still, tension reigned for the first fifteen minutes. They sat under the pavilion in the backyard, surrounded by blossoming trees, flowers, and the mid-afternoon sun.
Kressick clacked utensils around, sipped loudly on mimosas, and fed the small talk Ada detested. As the lunch dragged on, she nearly lost her nerve. Could she really ask for such an amount? Then Moretz caught her eye, flashed a smile, and she caught the moment.
“I spoke to the hospital today,” she left out any mention of Cybil, “and my mom’s condition is unchanged.”
Moretz’s smile slid, and he nodded. “Ah yes. Gemina received a second synth heart, right? I hope she’ll recover in time.”
He covered her hand with his, followed by a pat.
She allowed the contact. “Her recovery would be guaranteed, if only we could afford the synth payments.”
Running water from nearby fountains underscored the silence.
Moretz crossed and uncrossed his legs, shifting away from Ada. “How much do you need?”
She shrugged. “A mere five million.”
Kressick coughed, taking big gulps of the mimosa.
“Bringing up a number like that, in such a way, tells me you’ve done your research,” Moretz said.
She popped a grape in her mouth. For most of the lunch, she hadn’t touched the food on her plate.
He went on, “If you had researched further, you would know I donate larger sums than that every year. I’d be happy to pay for Gemina’s synth. The least I could do for you both, really.”
He graced her with another fake grin.
She forced a civil answer: “Thank you.”
She sounded monotone, but Kressick made a noise of approval anyway.
“Hopefully, we can move past any misunderstandings and begin to build a future together,” Moretz intoned.
She recalled him saying the same thing during a recorded speech two years ago at the governor’s ball. Once a politician, always a politician.
“Let’s toast to family, forgiveness, and good health!” Kressick brought up his nearly empty glass.
Moretz and Ada joined in, clinking glasses and never taking eyes off one another.
Lunch was concluded shortly after, and she rode back to her grandfather’s townhome.
During the short ride, he commented on his son’s actions. “That was rather nice of Brontes. I knew he would do the right thing.”
“I’ll believe it when he pays out,” Ada replied.
Four hours later, her wristlet buzzed, prompting a message splay across her skin. She held out her arm to read it.
Thank you for the latest payment in regards to Gemina Freyr.
Past account balance: $4,990,000.
Current account balance: $0.
Have a blessed day, Citizen!
The hospital missives had never ended so cordially before. The administrators were happy now that they had their money. As for Ada, she had to re-read the message several times before she absorbed its meaning. Her mother was free, no Amnesty or threat of the alienating N.A. status.
I’m free, too.
Free to finish the mission. Moretz, idiot that he was, had done as she asked, and now he was expendable. His charity had proved him kind or smart, but not both. Killing a kind man seemed...unfair. He had damaged her, abandoned her, but that was years ago, and he did seem l
ike a different person.
A part of her railed against any hint of forgiveness. Another part of her calmed the crazy by promising an honest assessment of her father, not a swift move to perdition.
Even bastards deserved a fair shake.
Twenty Two
Although the awkwardness had yet to fully fade, Moretz and Ada moved into a more comfortable space in their relationship. She questioned him about his encounters with Sammies, and he shared stories of flight, daring, and death. Aware of his manipulative intent, she took his answers with caution. She still rejected his smiles, which never quite reached his eyes.
During this, she got to know her other family. Some of her time was spent with Phennell, and the rest she devoted to Darcy. Darcy was not the friendliest of siblings, but neither was Ada. Their third meeting at the Moretz estate had been one of verbal insults and near threats. Through Phennell’s interference, the two met again for a fourth time, and the fourth time sealed an unsteady friendship between them.
They were in Darcy’s bedroom, sharing bursts of half- interested sentences before the awkward silence swallowed up their words again. A small roach crawled across the floor, and Ada felt relief at the disruption from the stillness. Darcy experienced no relief. She screamed and begged Ada, who had trouble taking steady aim because she shook with laughter, to get rid of it.
At the last second before frying the bug, she stopped. Darcy knew nothing of her abilities, and to reveal them might sever their relationship for good. Her shoe served as a replacement. Darcy cheered the small act of murder, and Ada was her hero for a few hours. The incident broke some of the tension, and they relaxed, shared secrets, and laughed at each other.
Again, she tried to warn Ada away from being with Phennell, but she waved off the warnings. “I can handle him.”
And she was handling him. On the outside, it might’ve seemed like he was taking advantage of her, but she was the one taking advantage. She needed someone to touch, someone to lose herself in, and then after, she wanted to forget about them. He came close to fulfilling her needs.
A few mornings out of each week, she and Darcy jogged with each other. They would keep the same steady pace with Darcy sneaking peeks at Ada.
“Do you wanna ask me something?”
She blushed. “Um, I guess.”
“Well?” Ada prompted.
Well, more like panted. “How is it you’re not...tired?”
“You mean, how can I run with Black Lung?”
Darcy nodded.
“I see. I told you about my house, about the roaches, and you assume I’m too poor for a Clean and Clear. Well, you assumed correctly. After my mom got sick, I found one hidden in her room, and I’ve been using it ever since.” She pounded her chest lightly. “Never felt better.”
“I didn’t mean to, I don’t know. I think they should be free.” Darcy fumbled to move the conversation along.
Normally, Ada would have been insulted to hear such statements and assumptions from anyone else. However, Darcy was young, and she had been conditioned as a Prominent. The girl didn’t know any better, and probably meant no harm with her question.
She cut her sister a break by saying, “Yeah, I think they should be free too.”
When they got back to the Moretz estate, Darcy went to shower. Ada was left alone in the living room with Phennell. He was sitting on the couch long-ways, swiping images on his arm. He didn’t look up at her, and she didn’t look at him. They’d screwed twice, and it had been all right. However, talking afterward had been a problem. Their physical intimacy seemed to have wiped away their camaraderie, and she flashed back to Darcy’s warning about him.
Moretz and Kressick entered the room.
“Ready to go?” Kressick asked.
She gave a last look at her mediocre lover. The boy was more interested in a holographic screen than her face.
“Yeah, let’s do this thing,” she said.
She had agreed to go on a purge with her father and grandfather. Days before, she asked Moretz what he meant by the word “purge”. He described an ancient ritual, a release of energy and a meeting of the powerful. The description was useless to her, but Kressick was even less forthcoming. In her imagination, they were meeting a group of like-minded freaks on the private fields located on the Moretz estate.
Moretz led Kressick and Ada to a golf cart. She rolled her eyes. A miniature gas guzzler, a glass holograph proclaimed on the golf cart’s dashboard.
A few miles from the house, they came to a separate clearing surrounded by a row of trees too perfectly lined up to be grown in their place by Mother Nature. The closer they got to the trees, small black lines inscribed in the bark disturbed her.
“I thought you could only manipulate electronics,” she said to Moretz.
He parked the golf cart near the trees. “There are times when I can do other things.”
He didn’t elaborate on the other things. “Are any of those marks from you?”
Ada helped Kressick out of his seat, more to pick his brain than because he needed the help.
“No, my powers are strictly internal,” he said.
“Did any of the marks come from Darcy?”
The two men exchanged looks, and she was kept out of their silent communication.
“Her powers have yet to manifest,” Kressick finally answered. “Yours, however, have fully matured. It’s part of why we’re here.”
An altar stood before the sacrificial line of trees. It held books, papers, and small tokens she was sure were ancient artifacts. She couldn’t tell what they were or what era they had come from. She thumbed through the thick books, all of which felt as if they were going to fall apart as they were so old. The pages she could make out were covered with strange languages and pictures that featured women surrounded by fire.
“Fire?” She turned a page, flinching when it came out in her hands.
Kressick took the book with all the delicacy he would use if handling a newborn. “No, not fire. You know what it is. The renderings may be crude, and faded, but they mean something.”
Moretz was bringing a bag back from the golf cart. He unzipped the bag and took out a pair of shining gloves, similar to chain mail but thinner and lighter.
As he donned the odd apparel, she asked, “Are we sacrificing an animal tonight?”
“Don’t be silly,” Kressick said. “Why do you worship these books? They look about as reliable as the Bible.”
“We don’t worship the books. We respect the answers found inside. What other answer would you give? Why are we the way we are?” Moretz challenged.
The gloves made him appear different, larger. Then she decided he just looked stupid. “Genetics? Science?”
“All we know for sure about our powers is others before us had variations of it, and they always took part in the purge. Often, they purged several times a month.”
She tired of hearing vague references to what was shaping up to be a druid ritual. In high school, her friend’s sister had always gone to the bathroom after dinner. When Ada caught her puking into the toilet mid-meal, the girl calmly explained she was only purging. Other contexts for the word were all bad. To purge was to expel something evil. To be purged was not something she wanted to happen.
“What is the damn purge?” Kressick nodded at Moretz, who began staring intensely at the row of trees. The man was holding his breath, readying himself. If she didn’t know any better, she would’ve thought he had to take a shit.
“To purge is to release all spiritual and physical energy into the earth, channeled through the trees. You go for hours until there’s nothing left, then you collapse from the strain. It’s a draining experience, and for some it can take days to recover. After recovery, many purge again,” Kressick said.
It sounded like an insane process, and she didn’t want to be in a vulnerable position. She had done that, crying, pathetic, so sorry and she wasn’t going back to being that person.
“Why would anyone wa
nt to purge more than once?”
“With each purge, you only get stronger,” he said.
Purging sounded appealing after all.
~ * ~
When the ritual finished, Ada couldn’t see herself repeating the process.
Her arms and legs were no more. Their muscles had been replaced with liquid. She couldn’t stand, and she couldn’t walk. Her body would only allow her to throw up, then throw up some more.
One good thing about the purge was that it left Moretz in the same wrecked condition.
He led the ritual, using his special gloves to conduct the current, throwing out crackles of energy to the trees. His sparks left fine scorch marks, not small, but not anything spectacular. Ada let him show off what he could, then showed him her version of sparks. Much bigger sparks.
The lightning display frightened even her. She meant to up- show her father, but it turned into another thing entirely. The power took over, and it moved through her like a living thing. A rope pulled inside, and when it snapped, it took so much of her with it. Wave after wave of electricity left her arms. Control slipped away, and energy erupted from every point of her body. She pawed at her eyes, rubbing furiously to no avail. Panic raged, forcing her to her knees.
“Focus.” Kressick’s voice held a soothing quality, and it was the one thing she could find. She held on, concentrated, and the blinding white dissipated. The light leaving her body remained powerful, but was no longer catastrophic. From the air, Ada imagined she resembled a fireworks display.
She rasped a “thank you” to her grandfather, but he seemed not to hear her. Head bent in concentration, his hands cradled a glowing blue light, and the light was growing.
When the light expanded, it grew into a dome, surrounding the area. Ada’s next arcs of lightning absorbed into the dome, and she understood what he was doing.
