-1-

“Don’t touch me”

"Don't you dare touch me."

“Don’t touch me. Don’t fucking touch me”

Touch.

I always thought it was angsty bullshit, but maybe there is a reason he didn't like to be touched.

I get it.

 There’s a chance I’m crazy.

But there is also a chance I’m not.

At some point I must have sat down in the hallway. Luce is still in the bathroom and  he’s been in there for a while. I start to wonder if maybe he tried to escape or something, but I finally hear a toilet flush and the sink running.  After another 5 minutes of silence, I crack open the door and I see him standing in front of the mirror, his weight supported on the sink. He’s  rubbing his half-closed eyes.

I wonder if the reason his skin is so cold is because it’s just metal. I want to touch him again, but he’s wearing the cardigan and I can’t think of an excuse to touch him.

He doesn’t say anything to me on the way back to the lab and rolls immediately into bed. It doesn’t take long for his breaths to even out as he goes back to sleep.

There is a chance I’m crazy.

But there is also a chance I’m not.

Stilling myself with one last breath I creep slowly over to his bed and undo the top strings of the hospital gown. I lay my finger as softly as possible against the faint skin of his clavicle.

 It’s cool to the touch.

I lay three more fingers down and I can feel the gentle thrum of a heartbeat, but no blood pulsing behind it.

But, what the fuck ?

I had seen his nose bleed just a few hours ago when he fell on the floor.

I want to get a close look at his stomach and see the skin where his navel should be, but if someone comes down here, there will be no explaining myself.

Here is what I know;

All fetus’ grown either organically, naturally or invitro are fed through ambilical chords that leave scars. Always. So, if he is infact something created , it’s not something that could be done here in the Republic. They don’t have the technology or resources.

This is something that had to be done in the East. The place Sara is so desperate to get back to, but won’t tell me or anyone why.

All of it starts to click; his dead eyes, his cold skin, the way Sara seemed to turn him off when we were at Rayne’s. I don’t know what the deal is with Luce; but he’s not human.

Sara must like her secrets. And I’m going to expose every one of them to get my way home.

***

“Alan, my boy!” he calls behind  careful steps as he descends into the lab.

I’m standing by one of the lab sinks washing my face when Jean comes in. He practically skips over and wraps his long arms around me while kissing the side of my head.

“Welcome to the family, brother,” He laughs

I don’t return any of it.  I can’t.

“Jean I have to tell--”

I stop when I see Sara and Blackbird come down the stairs.  Blackbird is holding a large silver case over his shoulder and doesn’t even look  at me like we share a secret between us. I  nonchalantly check my pocket for my SIN chip. It’s still there.

Sara steps quickly over to  Luce and shakes him gently awake.

It takes every inch of me not to stare at them. I want to be able to decode something in their interactions.

“Wake up,” She says as he slowly opens his eyes. “We’re going home.”

He sits up quickly

“Why? My leg isn’t fixed.”

“Blackbird can’t fix it right now--,” she starts.

“No,” he cries. “You promised me.”

“I promised I’d make the pain go away--” 

“That’s not enough,” he retorts

Seemingly unbothered, Blackbird sets the silver case next to Luce and opens it to reveal a cybernetic leg made of exposed wires and plastic. It’s pretty unsophisticated, the top of  the leg has a series of straps and pins

“ Your leg is complicated. This one will be a temporary solution until I can find someone who can help me get you a leg like you had before. This one is about your height and should be enough to get you back on your feet,” Blackbird explains.

With each word I see the rage flash through Luce’s eyes and Sara has her arms crossed over her stomach in an apprehensive gesture.

“Just try it on Luce,” she finally says.” You can always take it off.”

Jean puts his arm around my neck and guides me to the door.

“Let’s give them some privacy,” he says.

-2-

I wanted to hang back and talk to Blackbird—if anyone he most know something about Luce, but I lose my nerve. Jean guides me  up the stairs and outside the house to where the blue sports car is sitting outside the curb. Jean pauses before opening the passenger side door.

“Be gentle,” he says softly, unlocking the door.

Minnow is curled up in the far side of the car, her hair pulled away from her manicured face in a ponytail made of curls. She doesn’t even look up when I get in next to her. I  quietly open the silver box Rayne gave me and pretend to examine the credit card and Syndicate inside.   It was kind of nice to have some resources.

 “Congratulations,” Minnow chokes out.

“For what ?,” I spit at her.

“For doing in 2 months what I’ve been trying to do for 2 years,” she goes on

“You think I wanted this ? I didn’t ask for any of this. ” I sneer. “You could have killed me by injecting that much shit into my body--”

“You could have said no--”

“I did say no.” I remind her. "You seem to be just fine."

She turns her head and her violet streaked ponytail swings over her head.

“Alan, I’m sorry. I just….I forget that things affect us differently. I have a higher tolerance for a lot of shit, so I forget what it does to virgins. I didn’t mean for any of this. Honestly,” she says meekly.

“I know,” I force myself to say. “It’s okay.”

Only it’s not. I’m still angry with her, I hate her and the way she uses people, but I may need her at some point.  The scales have shifted and now  she owes me something.

I always thought Minnow represented a kind of freeness and beauty I could never have in my own life. But something has changed in me and she’s been knocked off the pedestal I accidentally put her on.  Nothing about her was ever real; her emotions, her body, her words.

She’s just a girl with so much self-hate, she does everything to destroy anything real about herself and  takes the people closest to her down with her.

Minnow shifts from her spot to scoot closer to me. She hesitates for a moment before putting her arms around me and resting the side of her head momentarily on my shoulder.

“I’m so sorry. I’ll never do anything like that again,” she breathes.

Minnow’s touch feels awkward around me, like she is struggling to hold on to me.  I cast my eyes sideways to look at her hands and see her right ring finger has been severed.

***

 

“NO. Again.”

Pop

“NO.”

Pop.

“NO ”

Pop

“Stop. Are you fucking with me or are you really this incompetent ?”

I lower the gun and consider changing my aim and just shooting her in the face. But I know I won’t.

“I’m not made for this,” I scream at her over my clogged ears

“You don’t have a choice,” Sara reminds me

“You should have let me die.”

“I wasn’t letting you off that easy, “ she retorts.

“I'm just going to get killed.” I reason with her. “ Rayne needs people like you, not me.I have no skills, there is nothing he can do with me.”

“None of us have skills,” she throws back at me. “In case you haven't noticed, none of us really know what we are doing. Hell, the entire cartel is barely hanging on, but yet here we are. I hate to tell you this, but you’re going to fail a lot. Especially you, collarboy. You’re going to fall hard and fast, but if you ever want to get back home, you’d better stand back up.”

She walks up to me and snatches the weapon from me.

“Feet apart, eyes focused and always brace yourself,” Sara repeats.

She aims at the target—one of the black couches—and shoots.  I watch the tight muscles in her bare stomach  jolt as  she shoots  a round of bullets at the painted on on target. The casings pop back at her, grazing her eyelashes but she doesn’t even flinch.

With a smug look, she gives me back the gun.

I can’t wait to wipe the look off her face.

There are bullet holes everywhere. In the couches, the refrigerator, the headboards. We don’t have use for this stuff anymore.

We’re moving.

All apart of a new deal and venture Rayne and Sara had been working on while I was recovering at Blackbird's. I don't ask for details. All of the furniture and contents of the house have been scattered around the front yard. We can only take what can fit in one moving truck. Minnow has been inside most of the day attempting to fit all of her and Jean's clothes into three plastic bins.

 “Enough of this for the day. I’m going for a run,” she says.

“Want me to finish packing your shit ?” 

She thinks for a moment before nodding her head.

When she turns away from me, I smile to myself. I’d been waiting for an opportunity to offer all day. Sara’s predictable in a couple of ways, like how she never does anything she thinks is a waste of her time. Which is nearly everything.

I tuck the gun into the belt around my waist and head into the house. Sara’s already packed all her private and secretive materials, but that’s fine. That’s not what I’m looking for.

I go to her nearly empty bedroom and search around until I find the throwaway box of malfunctioning screens and take one out. I pack a box of her clothes and head out to the truck with the defective screen hidden underneath the clothes box.

Once I’ve disappeared into the confines of the truck, I quickly shoot the lock off Sara’s private box and switch out her real screen for the defective one and take a few other things I may need to break into her information.   I push her private box back into the truck. When we get to the new loft, I’ll be sure to take that box out and drop it or something to explain the broken lock.

When I walk out of the truck, one of Rayne’s guards, Griffin,whose been helping us move, is running towards the truck.

“Did I hear shots ?,” Griffin asks, his baretta raised.

“Yeah, I forgot the safety. Sorry,” I say

He curses me out before going back inside.

***

There isn't much to Treasure Island.

Minnie, Sara and I christen the new loft with shots of tequila, courtesy of Rayne.

Treasure Island was one of the older buildings that got blown out in the nuclear blasts. It was barely standing from the damage of the Serial Wars so, it’s no surprise it just toppled over. People had been squatting inside and don't think anyone survived.

 Rayne came in under the table and bought the building after the collapse, he had a crew working nearly 24 hours for the last few weeks to turn it into apartments for the cartel.

Treasure Island is smaller than the house, it's split level without a basement. Rayne charges us  for rent, which I have to split with Sara and Jean.  Sara's room is the largest with an en suite bathroom, mine is the smallest and I can barely turn around in it.

It’s strange to have my own bedroom. My own bed, my own desk. Hell, it’s strange wearing my own underwear.  But it’s a good strange. I feel a kind of indebtness to Rayne that I know is dangerous.

I’d been pouring shots over my shoulder all night and when Sara suggests music and starts going through the music queue on Minnie's Syndicate  , I take the time to slip out of the little party and head up to my room. I open my only box from the move and take out the screen I stole from Sara.

Sara hadn’t unpacked yet, so if I get all the information I can tonight, I can get the screen and her equipment back in the truck parked outside before she notices it’s missing.

I flip on the screen and it’s password protected, like I predicted. I take out the logic coded program I saw  Sara try and use on Morrissey’s Panic Room. I plug it in and  it immediately starts circulating passwords, using assumptions and key strokes until it chokes out an affirmative password:

To Be Or Not To Be

I know the phrasing, but can’t place it.

The screen opens and cascades with files, hundreds of windows flip open and closed until I am left with hundreds of tabs. I flick through them at random and to my surprise most of them are uninteresting personal tabs. She’s been ordering perfume, clothes, furniture; looking at Luce’s grades  and tangentially researching boarding schools; there are news tabs from every news bureau in the Republic.

The first thing that stops me is an image of me she’s been running a search on. She must have taken it when I wasn’t paying attention, it looks like I’m talking to Minnow. I don’t recognize myself at first, I’m so thin an d sickly. She’s searching the image through a secure database that has been running for 168 hours and hasn’t found a single match.

So she honestly dosen't know my real name.

I’m an hour into my search when I stumble across a secure file that is in the process of being downloaded. I plug the logic code back in and it runs for only a minute before spitting out the password.

A Long Life of Calamity

The file opens and the screen fills with the logo of the running man with fire in his hands. I scroll down to see the name Tempus EU inscribed underneath.

Tempus EU ?

Tempus Eastern United State. That must be what they call it here.

The date of the file is  dated about 21 years ago and looks like it was scanned in from paper documents. It’s all handwritten letters, bank statements and proposals. Everything that isn't a budget spreadsheet is transcribed by hand, so it’s hard for me to read.

The budget proposal states that 30 years ago Tempus started a confidential project that cost over 5 billion dollars. The summary says the project involves experimentation with biofusion, biofarmed organs, cell replication and cybernetic technology.

There are a few resignation letters that have employees leaving because of ethical matters.  The closer to present day it gets, the more resignations there are. I don’t recognize any of the names on any of the files, but  maybe there is a reason for that.

Since the Saint project went so terribly, any kind of unauthorized creation or cybernetic approximation of life became a capital crime. It’s the only crime in the East that gets you the death penalty.

I skim the documents from 7 years ago, when Sara said her husband was killed and look for a mention of Derek Grace. I spot his name on a disciplinary roster, he got punished with a week no pay for being in an unauthorized area. He was caught  with another Tempus employee.

An intern.

Jean Dory.

I don’t have time to process what I see because I hear someone coming up the stairs. I I don’t have anything to save the file on, so I take  pictures with my Sydnicate to read later. Whoever is walking up here is failing at it and is moving slowly. I get about 10 pictures in before I shut the screen off and toss it under my bed.

I stand up and open my bedroom  door. I see Sara standing on top of the steps, breathing hard.

She’s more drunk than I’ve ever seen her.

“Did you fall down the stairs ?,” I ask her.

“Yes, but I stood back up the eighth time ! ,” she slurs with a smile.

I hear Luce's door slam as she comes toward me with her arms wide open.

“Alan, Alan, Alan…,” she breathes against me. “ I should have killed you when I had the chance,  but you’re one of us now. And tomorrow if your first day work. But don't worry, we’re going to make so much money tomorrow. Are you ready ?”

“I just want to pay my debt and go home.” I respond.

“Don’t we all,” she sighs.

She let’s go of me and if she notices my nerves or something being off, she doesn’t say it.

--

A/N

So, that Fall Down Seven Times, Stand Up Eight thing is a Japanese proverb that I appropriated.

Don't ask me who Griffin is and why he has a name. He just seems to.