by Dan Wells
“It looks kind,” said Alain.
“I thought you were going to say ‘fair,’” said Marisa.
“Fair is a dangerous word,” said Alain. “There’s too much baggage, and too much to undo; the only way to get ‘fair’ is to burn the whole thing down and start over, and no matter what you think of me I hope you don’t think I want that.”
“You want kindness,” said Marisa, feeling for the first time as if something in this situation made sense. “You want the Kwon Chaewons of the world to look down and help out the children hunting wild nulis just to survive.”
Alain smiled sadly. “Is that too much to ask?”
Marisa said nothing, and took another bite of the food.
“Now it’s your turn,” said Renata. “We told you our story, and now you tell us yours.”
“Oh, me? I was just in there for fun,” said Marisa, stirring her food. “Just a kiddie coder, joyriding their network for kicks.” She shrugged. “I told you I’d trade my story for yours; I didn’t say it’d be worth it.”
TEN
Renata dropped Marisa off at a train station, by the platform for the Red Line, and Marisa watched her drive away and then walked through the crowd to the far side of the station, waiting for the Blue Line. Just to throw them off one last little bit.
While she waited for the train she composed several emails and voice messages, explaining to everyone where she’d been—or at least a version of it that wouldn’t terrify any of them. Once she was on the train hurtling toward home she turned off her anonymizer and signed into her accounts again, sending out the pre-composed messages to Sahara, Sandro, and her mother. Her father she called directly.
“Marisa Jimena Carneseca Sanchez,” her father growled, answering the call without even a hello. “Y donde estás?”
“Coming home,” she said. “I’m sorry I didn’t answer your calls.”
“You turned off your GPS,” said Carlo Magno. “You’re not even supposed to be able to do that on the Ganika 7 djinnis. You get home right now.”
“I told you I’m coming home,” she said. “I’m on the train.”
A message from Sahara popped up, but she ignored it, sending back a quick can’t talk right now to quell any further interruptions. Arguing with her father required her full attention.
“It’s nearly midnight,” he said.
“I’ve been out past midnight before.”
“Not on a school night.”
“Technically I have,” she said, and cut off his angry interruption with a hurried follow-up: “But I know that’s not your point, and I’m sorry. I’m not trying to be bratty, I’m letting you know that I’m safe and I’m coming home.”
“Your curfew is ten,” said Carlo Magno.
“I know,” she said, “and I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be out this late.”
“So you accidentally stayed out two hours past curfew with your GPS turned off?”
Marisa squeezed her eyes shut, trying to decide if the truth would get her in more trouble than a disobedient lie. Was it even possible to tell him that she’d turned off her GPS for safety reasons without prompting more questions on the subject, and eventually explaining that she’d broken several laws and met some terrorists and blown something up and ran over a guy with a truck? Probably not.
“I was hanging out with some friends,” she said. “And they live in kind of a scary part of town, and I was worried that someone creepy was going to scan my ID and try to find where I live.”
“Mari, I can’t even find you online, and we live in the same house.”
“Because anonymity is important.”
“Not from your parents.”
“That was an . . . undesirable side effect,” said Marisa. “I’m sorry.”
“You should never turn your ID off.”
“It’s different for guys,” she said. “You don’t have to worry about some chango following you home.”
“You shouldn’t be hanging out with changos in the first place,” he said.
“I know,” she said, for what felt like the hundredth time in the conversation. “And I’m not going to hang out with them again, so don’t worry.”
“Good,” he said with a sigh. “We almost called the cops, you know—not just the nuli responders, but the real police. Another ten minutes and I would have been talking to Sergio Maldicho Maldonado, begging him to help me find my baby girl.”
“I’m fine,” she said. “I can take care of myself. You need to learn that sooner or later—I’m going to college in a year, you know; I’m practically an adult.”
“Oh mírale,” he said, “my own daughter lecturing me on how to be a parent. You’re the one who needs to learn some things, mija. You can’t screw around forever.”
“Do you remember college?” she asked. “I haven’t even begun to screw around yet.”
“This is the time to be saying that?” he asked. “I don’t think you understand how much trouble you’re really in.”
“I’m almost there,” she said, looking at the scrolling signs on the wall of the train. “Give me five minutes to walk home.”
“Sandro’s meeting you at the station,” he said. “Vengan de prisa.”
“Claro,” she said, and blinked to end the call. She blinked again as the train slowed to a stop, asking her navigation program to find Sandro, and when the doors opened she stepped out to find a faintly glowing arrow superimposed on her vision, leading through the crowd to where her brother was standing. “Hey.”
“Hey,” said Sandro. “Have fun?”
“Not really,” she said, falling in step with him as they turned to walk toward home. “Sorry to pull you away from your homework.”
“I’m done for the night anyway,” he said. “Eduardo fried a circuit in our ranger nuli, and we can’t do anything else until we get a new part tomorrow.”
“A ranger nuli?”
“For endangered animals,” he said. “They use them in Africa all time, to follow elephants around and protect them from poachers.”
“By shooting them?” asked Marisa.
Sandro smiled. “Well, ours doesn’t shoot anybody, but I think I’ve figured out how to redirect the excess solar power into a stun gun.”
“Be careful,” she chided, “I’ve seen Mrs. Threlkeld throw a kid out of class for way less than proposing the plans for a hypothetical stun gun.”
“Oh, you’re giving me behavior advice?” he asked. “Hang on a sec, let me get the notepad app opened up so I can write this down.”
She frowned. “So I’m out late,” she said. “You don’t have to be all Papi about it.”
“What does your world look like?” he asked. “Once you don’t have anyone forcing you to . . . brush your teeth, or not commit federal crimes, or whatever?”
She stared at him a moment, shocked by the similarity of that question to the one she’d just asked Alain. What should she answer? She looked down at the sidewalk they were walking on, and the street beside it; the weeds and the cracks and the garbage. How long until Mirador looked just Kirkland, too poor to take care of itself, and too broken to fix? Did she want to be rich? Her life to be easy? To be fair?
“My world looks kind,” she said at last. “Or at least I want it to.” It was the only word that felt right.
School night or not, half the house was still awake when Marisa and Sandro walked through the door; Marisa could hear her parents talking in the kitchen. “Welcome home, Marisa,” said the house computer.
“Hey, Olaya,” said Marisa. “Who’s in bed?”
“Inez and Gabriela and Pati,” said the computer. It was kind of a stickler for full names, but Pati hated “Patricia” and had somehow convinced it to use her nickname. One of these days Marisa would try to do the same for their grandma—nobody called Abue “Inez”; it was practically blasphemy.
“We’re back,” Sandro called into the kitchen, though Olaya would already have told their parents they were home. He started up the stai
rs without waiting for a response. “Have fun.”
Marisa wandered slowly toward the kitchen, dreading the encounter. These things always turned into a yelling match, and trying to explain the truth—that she was trying to learn the truth about her past—would make her father even angrier than the hacking. She took a deep breath and stepped into the doorway. Her parents were hunched over a tablet on the kitchen table, muttering softly. They were upset, but, she soon realized, not at her. Every couple of seconds one of them would reach out and tap or swipe the touch screen, and the two of them would stare at it, grimacing or clucking their tongues, before shaking their heads and tapping it again. Marisa watched them for a few minutes from the doorway, leaning against the side, not saying anything. There was only one thing that made them this quiet and concerned.
“Money?” she said softly.
“Technically,” said her mother.
“The lack of it,” said Carlo Magno.
Marisa felt her chest tighten. “How bad is it?”
Carlo Magno sighed and closed his eyes, rubbing them slowly with the palms of his hands. Guadalupe stared at the tablet a moment longer before looking up at Marisa with sad, tired eyes. “They raised the connection rates again. We just can’t afford it anymore.”
“KT Sigan?” asked Marisa, stepping forward. It was just like Alain said. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
“I wish I could say I was surprised,” Carlo Magno blurted out, his anger erupting from deep inside of him like lava. “But what do we expect, when a company can swoop in and own the entire Mirador network—all the cables, all the repeaters, all the signal nodes—and push every other company out. Dios mio, I remember when I was a child and a connection to the internet was a luxury, something we used for shopping, or talking to our friends, or playing games. It made things easier. Now, it’s just as necessary as electricity, or water. Nothing in this house or in the restaurant can run without it, and if we lose the restaurant we lose everything.”
Marisa felt numb. “What are our options?” she asked.
“Sell the house,” said Carlo Magno. “We could buy a few months if we move back into the apartment over the restaurant, but all our customers are in the same situation, and if they can’t afford to stay customers, we’ll just have to move again. Somewhere with cheaper service. Maybe all the way to Mexico—”
“She doesn’t need to hear this,” said Guadalupe.
“She’s practically an adult,” said Carlo Magno, throwing his hands in the air. “She told me herself.”
“You don’t need to hear this,” said Guadalupe, looking at Marisa directly. “We’ll find a way to make this work. Maybe Don Francisco can do something—”
“Never,” said Carlo Magno, folding his arms sternly.
“He might,” said Guadalupe. “He’s a crook and a bastard—sorry for the language, Marisa—but he cares about Mirador. He protects us from the gangs—”
“Using protection money his thugs force us to pay,” said Carlo Magno.
“But he does it,” said Guadalupe. “His methods are questionable, but he’s kept Mirador peaceful and livable while every neighborhood around us is descending into chaos. It’s not in his interest for us to lose our home.”
“He’s a mobster,” said Carlo Magno, dismissing the idea with a curt wave of his hand, “and Sigan is no better. They call it a price hike? I call it more protection money from more crooks.”
It’s happening exactly like Alain said it would, thought Marisa.
“Maybe we can refinance the restaurant,” said Guadalupe. “The value of the house keeps dropping, but the restaurant is worth more than we paid for it—not much, but enough to squeak out another few dollars a month.”
“Don’t,” said Marisa quickly. Her parents looked up at her in surprise.
“Why not?” asked Guadalupe.
“Don’t talk to your mother that way,” said Carlo Magno.
“In the next few days, maybe next week, we’re going to get an offer to refinance,” said Marisa. “Don’t do it.”
“But why not?” Guadalupe repeated. “I know it’s frightening, chula, but we might have to—”
“Because it’s exactly what they want us to do,” said Marisa.
“Marisa?” said a sleepy voice behind her. Marisa turned and saw Pati, wearing shorts and one of Marisa’s old T-shirts, bleary-eyed and holding a tablet.
“What are you doing up?” Guadalupe asked. “You’re supposed to be asleep.”
“Marisa promised she’d help me with my binary,” said Pati.
“It’s late,” said Marisa.
“Just help her,” said Guadalupe, rubbing her eyes. “She’s been going on about this all week—help her and get it over with.”
“It’s after midnight,” said Marisa.
“So come home earlier next time,” said Carlo Magno, hunching back over the table.
“Blerg,” said Marisa, looking at the ceiling. She sighed, trying to think of a way out of it, but she was too exhausted. “Fine,” she said, taking the tablet from Pati’s hand, “come on. If you’re even awake enough to pay attention.”
Pati followed her into the living room. “Whose pants are you wearing?”
“You’re awake enough,” said Marisa quickly, looking back over her shoulder. Had her parents heard that? She’d forgotten about the pants. Time to get this over with quickly and lock herself in her bedroom. She led Pati to the well-worn couch, fired up the tablet, and looked over the homework assignment. “Okay, this is pretty simple—they’re just story problems, but you have to give the answers in binary instead of base ten.”
“I know what it is,” said Pati, “but binary is stupid.”
“Binary is how computers think,” said Marisa. “Everything we put into a computer gets turned into machine code—a bunch of ones and zeroes—and then the computer finds the answer, converts it back into human code, and gives it to us. You have to know binary so you can learn programming.”
“I already know Artoo and Bowie and Piller,” said Pati.
“You know Piller?”
“I know some Piller.”
“Good for you,” said Marisa. “I barely know any Piller. And Bowie’s not a language, it’s an interface, but that’s beside the point. Just trust me: binary’s important, and you’ll be glad you learned it.”
“Uuuuuuuuuuuuuuh,” said Pati, sticking out her tongue and closing her eyes. “Fine.” She opened her eyes and pointed at the tablet. “So in the first question Rodri has five sticks, and Selma has seven, and I need to tell this idiot robot how many sticks there are in total, and I said twelve and I was wrong. Please don’t tell me that math is a lie, because I will burn this entire house to the ground.”
“Robby the robot only speaks binary,” said Marisa, pointing at the question. “So you have to convert the numbers. We use a base-ten number system, with only ten numerals.”
“One through ten,” said Pati. “I know this already.”
“Ten’s not a numeral,” said Marisa. “It’s a number made out of two numerals: zero and one. The ten numerals we use are zero through nine, and every number we want to make, we can make out of those.”
“But binary only has ones and zeroes,” said Pati. “Five and seven and twelve don’t even exist in that number system.”
“Sure they do; they just have different names. Binary and base ten are like English and Spanish—you can say all the same stuff, it just sounds different.”
“Can’t we just teach a computer base ten and . . . problem solved?” asked Pati.
“Binary is good for computers because it mimics the way a circuit works,” said Marisa, “and computers are made of circuits. So: open and closed. On and off. One and zero. Once you know how it works, you can express anything in ones and zeroes—the entire world is really just a bunch of ones and zeroes, and . . .” She trailed off.
Ones and zeroes.
People who matter, and people who don’t.
“You can choose wh
ich one you are,” said Marisa.
“What?” asked Pati.
“It’s not just that you can choose,” said Marisa, “it’s that you have to choose. And if you don’t choose, the world chooses for you, and it will always choose zero.”
“What are you talking about?” asked Pati.
Marisa looked at her little sister, staring at her intently—at her face, at her clothes, at her life. At all of their lives, all together. She spoke softly: “Are we going to be zeroes forever?”
“I think you’re drunk,” said Pati.
“I think I might be,” said Marisa. “Because I’m seriously considering destroying a megacorp.”
ELEVEN
“Good practice today,” said Sahara. She was trying out a new avatar, an armored suit with imposing spikes and curves, colored in a palette of greens and blues. She took her helmet off in the team lobby and shook out her avatar’s hair—an exact copy of herself, as always. “Jaya, that was some of the best healing you’ve ever done, and I’m not just saying that. Anja, you were on point, and Fang, you were a coldhearted mistress of death.”
“Xiè xie,” said Fang. Her avatar looked like a ghost, the opacity scaled down as far as the game would allow.
“Marisa,” said Sahara. She paused, trying to form her thoughts, or possibly trying to find a polite way of saying what she needed to say.
Marisa, dressed in her old black stealth suit, smiled weakly. “Sorry.”
“Your head wasn’t in this today,” said Sahara.
“I know,” said Marisa, “and I’m sorry. I’ve been kind of distracted.”
“This is a big deal,” said Sahara. “I know that you’re still looking for Grendel, and you know that I’ll help you any way I can—if you’d invited me to help you yesterday I might have been able to do something then. But the tournament is next week. Five days away, and we’re not even close to ready—”
“It’s not that,” said Marisa. “I mean, it’s not all that—Grendel’s definitely a part of it—but right now it’s . . .” She puffed out her cheeks, trying to find the courage to bring it up. “It’s . . . I’ve been thinking about the party, and the fact that we have two extra invitations.”
