THE CABBY
By SEAN D GREGORY
What I wouldn’t give for the days when The Corporation didn’t own everything. Times were better back then. Easier. At least that’s how I choose to remember it.
Before the damned AI.
The tension in my jaw once again ignites the nerves in my gums, a surge of anger that threatens to overwhelm me over the emotional wave. For the thousandth time, I wonder how everyone could be so stupid. The later generations that came after mine just wouldn’t listen. It was almost as if they thought George Orwell, James Cameron, the Wachoskis, and the like were merely paranoid storytellers. The utter failure to heed the warnings in those prophetic stories accelerated civilization’s decline at a pace that I still find disorienting.
The bastards missed the point entirely. Nobody payed attention to the movies and books of my youth. And now, here I am, sixty-two years old, my beard looking like I have mange, skin wrinkled and dirt-lined, too broke to afford a shave or a daily shower, waiting by the Pittsburgh Light Rail Exit, hoping to catch a fare in this busted up clunker of a cab.
Thunderstorms blanket the Steel Valley, pounding the region for three days. The rivers crested over the “Bathtub” the day before yesterday and all over the city, streets are closed. It’ll be my luck to have to navigate the streets of Pittsburgh the long way, if I manage to snag a fare today.
I stare at the wipers as they beat a tempo that pushes reason, threatening to fly off the side of the vehicle, violently changing directions every second. For all their violent thrashing they do little to prevent the night-glare caused by the streaks of water and filmy residue. I really need to get the damn things replaced but rides have been a bit light that last few months and things like vehicle maintenance have fallen to the wayside in deference to rent and food.
The irony that if my vehicle dies I won’t be able to pay for rent or food, not withstanding.
I watch as the abstract painting of multicolored streaks from the lights outside shine through the cascading water running down the windshield. The swipes of the blades the only music with which to entertain myself, my mind wanders. The hypnotic beat of the armature changing the image on the windshield in repetitive alternating patterns, shifting my thoughts to a life lost to history.
Reds, yellows, blues, and oranges, form patterns that my mind transforms like a psilocybin induced image painted by Van Gogh. Overhead, the pounding of raindrops on the metal roof drum a cacophonous beat, out of rhythm with that of the wipers. The noise threatens to make my head explode, the ceiling liner long since ripped out due to rot. I close my eyes and an image of my wife comes back to me and my heart aches.
I blink myself out of the funk. It does me no good to dwell on the past. But sometimes the melancholy gets me.
It would have been easy to make my life better. If only I had agreed to the buyout ten years ago I’d be sitting pretty. But I didn’t want to have to answer to The Corporation. Who knew they’d own everything eventually?
Stupid decision. They drove me out of business instead. If something doesn’t break free soon, I’m not going to have a choice. Credits are low and I‘ve missed the insurance payment on this ancient beast of a vehicle the last three months.
Through the window I see the late night crowd making its way through the shiny glass doors of the rail station. Corporate workers in their color-coded uniforms, smatterings of black, yellow, blue, and red coveralls in a sea of white. The white suits of the Dregs, the lowly labor force, covered in dirt, grease, and grime. The white coveralls overwhelmingly outnumber the black uniforms of the executives, the yellow of engineers, the red of office workers, and the blue of supervisors.
The laughter and camaraderie within the labor force belies the stark reality of their existence: cattle for the lower paid jobs that drove the Machine. It’s with no small amount of disdain that I observe this younger generation, their joy in being slaves to the machine anethma to me. I’d rather be homeless than one of the Dregs. They don’t seem to know that they are no different that the slaves of history, Israelites in Egypt, Africans before Emancipation. Hell, I’d be shocked if one in one hundred of them knew of the Emancipation. Even fewer would know of the Israelites.
The greatest legacy of the last presidency of the old United States: the death of public education.
The death of a nation.
The death of the world.
At least most of them didn’t seem to care, blissfully moving through the machine, unaware that they had given up freedom.
But some remembered. Peppered throughout the sea of filthy white uniforms, slogging across the through-way of the station in the rain, I see them. The ones that understand. The ones, like me, who are old enough to remember when freedom was real or willing enough to listen to someone who remembered to listen to the ones that saw the birth of AI and became afraid. They knew the truth. They’ll never see real freedom again, never retire, never not work.
Artificial Intelligence sees no value in that.
I snort at the thought. Funny how lost I feel in this Shiny New World created by the AI that now runs things. That’s what they called it. A “Shiny New World”. But nothing about it seemed shiny. Or new. It wasn’t long ago that I had a thriving business developing space flight technology. I had a wife too. A dog. A yard with a pool. But all that was ancient history, lost in the fog that was my forties.
I sip my coffee. At least that’s free now. I remember how excited the world became over free coffee. Little did we know at the time, caffeine was the drug that would enslave us all. The first major change in The Shiny New World. The first shot in the war against mankind.
Of course, I seem to be in the minority. Looking out the window at the Dregs, their dirty uniforms that would be replaced with bright white ones at the start of their shift tomorrow, talking and laughing amongst themselves, lemmings walking off a cliff off to some illusion of freedom. Happy as long as they are drinking their small daily influx of credits away, every minute of life draining the credits in a rolling ticker that are now our currency accounts.
No. I have no desire to be one of those Dregs. I’ll take the uncertainty that is my life over the pretend assurance of theirs.
The familiar ding of my battery charge indicator goes off and I look down to see the light on my dashboard illuminated. I let out a curse. My battery is low again. If I don’t get a fare soon, I’m going to have to leave to charge the vehicle, losing my place in line and rolling away more ticks from my account. At that point I might as well just go back to the loft I share with two other cabbies and call it a night.
Another useless trek out.
The sound of my door opening behind me catches me off guard. I look up in the review as a dark form slides across the rain distorted light coming through the rear window into the back seat. The door shuts with a light bang, deliberately careful. The form disappears, spreading across the rear seat without a word. I can’t make it out because my dome light burned out months ago and the cost of a replacement bulb is too much for me at the moment.
“Hey,” I say, “You have to go to the front of the line.”
I look back out the windshield to see if the line attendant saw anything. The last thing I need is to get caught taking a fare out of turn. I hear heavy breathing and a sob. But nothing more. I turn to look at the person and see they moved down on the floor.
“You hear me? I could get kicked out of the line if you don’t leave. The cab in front gets the next fare.”
I tap the window between me and the back seat but get no response.
“Goddamn it,” I mumble and put my coffee in the cup holder in the dash. “I’m gonna have to drag you out.”
Now I’m angry. The rain is harder now than it was a moment ago and I have zero desire to spend the rest of the evening driving around soaked in my last bit of clean clothes. Way to make a shitty night worse, whoever you are.
“Just remember, you brought this on yourself,” I mumble.
I swing the car door open and step out into the monsoon. I let out a startled cry as I almost bump into a man in black trench-coat and a black outback hat. In his hand is the familiar Boom Rod of the Constabulary. His single red eye, the cybernetic identifier that assures his uniform is legit, narrows and I see the laser of his scanner implant move up and down my body.
I tense as I recognize he is searching for someone. Realizing it’s more than likely the dark form sprawled across the back floor of my cab, I resist the urge to look in my back window at the hiding passenger. I’m no lawbreaker, but I’ve heard the horror stories of what happens to people taken by Constibuls. I’m not sending a stranger down that road.
It’s a decision made quickly, though not lightly.
The red line that moves up and down my body vanishes as the Constibul completes his scan.
“Hank Roscoe. Age sixty-three. Male. Unaffiliated. Confirm?”
“Yes, I am Hank Roscoe. Identity 4-3-5-6-9-7 Bravo Kilo 9-5.”
“Identity confirmed.”
“You have to go to the front of the line,” I say, fighting to keep my heart from racing, afraid the Constibul will pick up on my sudden nervousness. Thankfully some nervousness is in order, as I would not want to break the law by accepting a fare out of turn and everyone gets a little nervous around these cybernetically enhanced boot-stompers. Thankfully, I have some familiarity with these guys and can fake it well. I sidestep and extend my arm, palm up, toward the front of the cab line.
He doesn’t move, tilting his head.
“Have you seen a woman? Rebecca Shaw? Black female, five-foot two, ninety-six pounds, short black hair, brown eyes?”
Thankfully I don’t have to lie since I have not seen the person in the back of my car beyond a dark shadow. Easy to answer the question asked.
“I have not. Now please go to the front of the line and take your ride there. It is the law.”
“I am aware of the law,” the boot-stomper says, pointing the Boom Rod at my chest. “Have you seen anyone matching that description?”
I’ve been stunned by the Boom Rod before. A shiver runs up my spine that has nothing to do with the rain that has now soaked me entirely.
“In this rain? Through these windows?” I slap the passenger window to emphasize the point, hoping that the person inside doesn’t move. “No. I was asleep. I came out to take a leak and you were here.”
The rain pours down my face, matting my hair, blurring my vision. The Constibul looks at me a moment longer, lowers his Boom Rod, and continues down the sidewalk. I watch as he scans from side to side. He stops and speaks with the line attendant whose body tenses at the sight of the Constibul. Everyone fears them. I turn back to the window of the backseat and look inside. It’s impossible to see anyone but I assume whoever climbed in is still there.
Sliding back into my cab, I close the door and rest my head on the steering wheel, water dripping and pooling around me. I let out a heavy sigh.
“He’s gone,” I say. I hear tears coming from behind me, soft sobs.
Just great. It’s obvious that whoever is back there has no intention of getting out so I start the vehicle and pull out of the line, pulling alongside the first car.
“Hey Hank! Where you going?”
“I’m calling it, Ronnie. My battery is down to 9%. If I don’t get home, I won’t make it home.”
He gives me an apologetic smile.
“I’m sorry Hank. It’s just slim pickin’s right now.”
I wave without another word and drive off, closing the window as I go. I don’t know what to do with the person in my car so I just head home.
“I’m going home,” I say. “When I get there you can leave. I don’t care where you go, but if you are still in my cab in the morning, I’m gonna have to call it in.”
Nothing. Just soft sobs.
The one room, fourth floor, apartment is dark when I enter, indicating my roommates are out for the night. Sharing the one room flat wasn’t in my plans for this point in my life, but that’s true for ninety percent of the world so there’s no sense complaining. It is what it is.
Actually, nothing about my life is where I planned it to be.
Damned AI.
At least, for tonight, I have the place to myself. The lights click on as I enter, LEDs illuminating six-hundred square foot space in a soft yellow glow. The only good thing about the apartment is that I’m not homeless. The only good thing about my roommates is that they are clean. At my age, fighting people over shared chores is not where I want to be.
None if this is where I went to be at my age.
“Welcome home, Hank” a near perfect human voice says.
“Hi, Morgana,” I say with no enthusiasm.
“I see you didn’t get a fare today. You are dangerously low on funds, Hank.”
“I’m aware. Thank you for the reminder.”
It creeps me out how much Morgana knows about my financial state.
The automated system that controls the apartment sounds exactly like the voice of my deceased wife. It’s on purpose. Run by the AI that runs most things, the algorithm ensures familiarity with those it interacts. Sometimes, when life isn’t kicking me in the nuts, I don’t mind it. Most times, like tonight, it makes my skin crawl. Feeling low, I don’t need to be reminded of the woman I loved most. She’s gone, killed by the third pandemic in as many decades. My choices, as deemed available by Morgana, are my dead wife, my bother whom I haven’t spoken to in twelve years, or an old colleague that passed away peacefully in his sleep five years ago.
For the hundredth time, I remind myself to change the voice knowing I won’t.
My brother can kiss my ass. And hearing Rick’s voice would just drive me insane, a constant reminder of the buyout I should have taken.
Two sets of bunk-beds, a square table with four chairs by the window, and a small sofa that only seats two, facing the large wall mounted screen are the only pieces of furniture in the room. It’s like being back at The Ohio State University and living in the dorms.
Without the parties and free flowing banter.
Or the sex.
If I could go back, I’d specialize in AI and change how we chose to implement the technology that makes my life less than languid. But I can’t go back. Pandora’s box was opened. It’s only a matter of time before Morgana decides to run us all underground like Terminator, enslave us like the Matrix, or just wipe us out War Games style with global thermonuclear war.
I hurriedly strip off my wet clothes and grab a towel. It’s still damp from the shower I took before my shift, but it’s all I have. Rubbing it through my hair, I take as much water out as I can before hanging it on the hook by the small shower. Heading over to my hamper, I dig out the cleanest clothes I can find.
“I really need to do laundry,” I say.
“If you do, that will cost you fifty credits,” Morgana chimes unprompted.
I hate how much control she has over my life.
I pull out my phone and open the Toke-ins app. My heart sinks as I see the balance rolling down, minute by minute charges for my share of the rent, utilities, and the cost of charging my cab, ticking away. I have less than eight-hundred credits now and if I don’t pull in some fares tomorrow I will be locked out of the apartment by the day after. It’s harder to make ends meet with the advent of “active billing”. What a stupid invention.
Stuck in the cycle of never-ending need, I click the lightning bolt for the Energuys app, and open the account with the picture of my cab. I was hoping to get half a charge tonight but I need to do laundry so I change the max charge setting from forty percent to twenty-five percent. I’m not going to have much more than a couple fare’s charge when shift starts tomorrow. Assuming they are short ones.
Assuming I don’t have another wasted night like tonight.
I grab my hamper, deciding to put everything into a single load, which will eat up fifty of my credits between soap, water, and electricity. But I don’t have a choice. My current outfit smells like a twelve year old boy’s locker room and the rest smells worse.
“Morgana, I’m leaving,” I say to the software that has ruined my life.
“Enjoy,” she replies. “Powering off lights in thirty seconds.”
Placing my phone in my pocket and wrapping an arm around my hamper, I take the twelve steps to the door, open it, and nearly drop my hamper in surprise. A woman matching the exact description that the Constibul at the station asked about stands, dripping wet, at the door to my apartment. The carpet underneath her has discolored from dripping water. She’s been standing there for more than a few minutes. Her presence sends a shiver down my spine. Her defensive posture, arms gathered around her chest, shoulders slumped, immediately makes me think she is afraid, even desperate.
Her mouth moves as if to speak and I shake my head vigorously, not wanting Morgana to hear her voice, pushing my way passed her as I close the door. I have no idea if the Constabulary knows this woman’s voice or not and I have no intention of finding out by letting Morgana hear this woman speak in my apartment.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I whisper as quietly as I can. “I don’t need any more trouble than I already have. I told you to go away. Whatever you want, I can’t help you.”
She looks up at me, her eyes pleading. I get a good look at her and realize she’s hardened. Her current state belies the battle tested lines in her face. She’s been through many “somethings”. She’s also much younger than I expected, barely and adult is my guess.
“Please help me,” she says, too loud for my comfort.
I look around, fearful of prying eyes and ears.
“I can’t help you. Now go away.”
Turning away, I head to the stairs that lead to the first floor laundry room, ignoring her. I can feel her eyes on me, but whatever she’s done, I want nothing to do with it. I don’t want to rat her out to the Constabulary either, but if she doesn’t leave me alone, I will have no choice.
I hold back a curse. I don’t need someone actively hunted by the Constabulary hanging around me. Harboring a fugitive is a capital crime in the Shiny New World. I’ve worked hard to stay out of The Corporation’s grip and this is just the thing that will end that effort. My life could be financially easier if I succumbed to the pressures of participating in the new way of things, but this world is too far removed from the world of my youth. I don’t want to participate voluntarily. For sure, involuntarily would be worse.
As I reach the top of the stairs, an alarm goes off in my head. Fast paced footsteps echo up the stairwell. A lot of them. The distinct drum of boots on the concrete stairs is one I’m all too familiar with. Whatever is coming is not a friendly visit from my fellow cabbies. I’ve made this sound too many times before in my youth. Combat boots. I turn and run back down the hallway and sprint. Whatever this is, I’m in it now.
I stop at a door and toss my basket into the room with the garbage shoot. Then, sprinting down the hall back to the woman who stares at me panic stricken, I wave for her to start running.
“Don’t just stand there, woman,” I hiss. “Run!”
Four years of instinct, born in Poland, fighting off the Russian incursion as an International Peace Keeper for the now defunct United Nations kicks in. When she isn’t already running upon my approach, I grab her by the arm, dragging her with me. To her credit she doesn’t resist and comes along willingly, pumping her legs as hard as she can. I reach the end of the hallway and open the window to the fire escape, stepping through and ushering her out the window, closing it behind me. A quick glance back reveals the shadows of human forms against the wall half a flight down the stairwell.
We don’t waste time hanging out. If they haven’t already, the Constibuls will interface with Morgana and she will tell them I am not in the apartment. They won’t waste time looking. They’ll immediately assume we came this way. I push the girl down the stairs ahead of me.
“Go, go, go, go, go!” I growl behind her, pushing her as hard as I dare on the slick, wet, metal stairs.
Above us, the sound of a blast echoes through the night and a rain of glass falls down upon us as we hit the last landing. The tinkling of glass on the metal escape mixes with the rain, sounding almost magical if not for the deadly Boom Rod wielders that are chasing us. With no time to waste, I hop over the railing, making the seven foot drop to the alley below. All around me I hear shouts as lights turn on in the apartment buildings, residents being woken in the middle of the night by the commotion. I hit the ground harder than I hoped, my feet stinging from the impact, my joints screaming at me for submitting them to the torture, too old to absorb impacts. My body crumples on the ground and I roll over.
I turn to look up but the woman surprises me by landing next to me, her landing more nimble than mine. She grabs my arm, helping me stand and we run straight to my cab, which I parked on the other side of the building. Within seconds we are sliding into the front seat of my vehicle and I punch the accelerator, the car coming to life immediately. Too late I realize I forgot to unplug it and as the instantaneous torque of the electric motor kicks in, I hear the electric cable rip away as the tires slide on the slick wet road a second before grabbing and propelling us forward.
I hope against hope I didn’t damage the charging port of my cab in the process.
We barely get a block down the road when she finally speaks.
“Give me your phone,” she demands, her voice shaking.
“What!” I yell. “I’m not giving you my phone! Who the hell are you?” I scream.
She winces at the volume but holds out her hand and calmly replies, “Give me your phone, now.”
I look at her and shake my head.
“No.”
She turns to me in the seat, “Where are you going?”
“I don’t know!”
“Well, they do. Now, to prevent them from knowing, give…me…your…phone.”
I realize her logic and don’t argue, reaching into my pocket and handing over what is essentially the only thing of value in my life besides this car. She takes it and holds it to my face which opens the screen and begins swiping through the apps. She finds the Toke-Ins app and opens it. Then she takes a small transfer key and plugs it into the phone.
“Those are illegal!” I yell.
“Well, hate to break it to you but you’re a fugitive now. Time to act like one. I’m draining your account. It’s not much, but it’s better than it getting seized.”
“What?”
She watches the screen and shows me my account. It’s drained of all credits…what few I had left. I feel my heart sink. Then she closes the screen and removes the transfer key and hands it to me. I look at what is essentially my life’s savings, a mere seven-hundred and ninety-one credits.
“This is your wallet now,” she says. “Pay for everything with this.” Then she looks around the cab. “How have you been able to keep this on the road? It’s an ancient piece of junk.”
“Thanks,” I say defensively. “I’ll have you know, the Tesla Model S was a game changer back in the day.”
“Yeah, I know,” she says. “I’m not knocking it. But how have you been able to keep it running?”
“You are knocking it. You called it a piece of junk. Fully charged nothing can keep up with this baby. I was an electronics engineer doing contract work for the old NASA before the world took a crap. I worked on electronic control systems for deep space missions. Cracking Tesla’s firewall was easy.”
“Wow. How old are you?” she asks.
“Old enough to remember a much better world,” I reply.
She rolls the window down as we come across the Roberto Clemente bridge and says, “Anything in here of value?” She wiggles my phone. I get a surge of fear.
“All my pictures of my wife. She’s gone now.”
“I’m sorry,” she replies and tosses my phone out the window. I freeze as it sails over the railing into the Allegheny River below. Everything in me collapses.
Tears fall as I realize that last bit of my life before AI is gone forever. First her touch. Then her scent. Then her voice. And now her face. Everything I had, the new world has taken away. It takes everything out of me not to drive over the railing into the muddy river below.
“Make the second right,” she says as we exit the bridge.
I don’t care where we go. I’m on autopilot now.
We don’t go far after leaving the bridge. The woman has me follow River Ave for while and then we turn onto another old bridge I’d never taken. The sign reads “30th”. I don’t know how long it takes to get here because I spent the entire time screaming about how much I hated what was happening, yelling at the woman for climbing into my cab, and throwing the last bit of my life away, punching the steering wheel in between swear words.
She sits quietly, watching the road ahead, only speaking when she wants me to turn.
Her route takes us to Herrs Island, a place I’d never visited in the thirty years I’d lived in Pittsburgh. The island used to be a quiet place to visit and, in better times, housed many boats and a rowing club. Now it is the slums. Flooding constantly due to the torrential rains that have grown ever more common in western Pennsylvania over the years, most people have abandoned the river and the bridge onto the island has fallen into disrepair. I grip the steering wheel hard, worried the bridge will collapse, taking me into a cold murky death in the Allegheny River.
Known for crime, poverty, and a complete lack of law enforcement now, Herr Island is desolate. Constibuls are not known to come here, seemingly not caring about the happenings of the forgotten.
I’ve never understood why Morgana left this place alone. Being here makes me wonder just how many other places Morgana ignores. The whole thing is strange to me.
Water is already starting to flood the island. Waterfront Drive, the only street on the island, sits under an inch of flowing water, carried forward like the river. Waves roll away from my vehicle as it pushes forward. The woman guides me to a small, three story, house, elevated on short stilts. I assume that is to provide protection from the flood waters which tells me the house is not the oldest building on the odd little island landmass that is relatively uncommon in Pittsburgh. As we pull up to the building, a door lowers like a drawbridge and she instructs me to drive up onto it. Pressing the accelerator I coax the vehicle up the narrow ramp and bring it to a stop when the front of the car almost touches a wall with a door in the middle, hidden inside. A ding followed by a red light tells me “hey fool you’re gonna walk”. Just perfect, I’m below five percent charge on the vehicle’s battery. The charging station barely did anything.
I start to get out of the car and she grabs my arm.
“Wait,” she says.
The garage door begins to close behind me and we find ourselves enveloped in complete darkness.
“It’s a safe house,” she says. “But they don’t know you, so, I need to go first.”
Not wanting to get murdered, I act as instructed and sit tight.
A dim light illuminates the tiny garage as a door in front of us opens. Standing within the glow, a silhouetted figure stares out at us and I am pretty sure they are pointing something at me. The woman rolls down the window.
“Christopher, it’s me.”
The silhouette shifts toward her side of the car.
“Ray? Is that you?”
“It is,” she says. “This guy is a friendly.”
“Who is he?”
“What’s your name?” she whispers.
“Hank Roscoe,” I whisper.
“Hank Roscoe,” she says. “Collateral damage,” she says.
“Dammit, Ray.” I watch as he lowers whatever weapon he was pointing. “Come here.”
She looks at me and says, “Stay put till I say otherwise.”
I nod.
She exits the car and I watch as she steps into the doorway, closing it behind her. I’m stuck in the dark, soaked to the bone for the second time. A chill runs through me, causing me to shiver.
It feels like forever in the darkness and, seeing as how I’ve already lost everything, I don’t really care if I lose my life too. I’m nobody’s stooge. Reaching into my glove box I pull out the illegal Springfield Shock-wave that I hide there and step out of the vehicle. I feel the comforting shape, similar to the service pistol I carried in the Peace Keepers. The only difference being this weapon fires an energy wave that could break bones and shut down hearts. My service pistol fired 9-mm rounds.
I close the door to the cab, quietly, not wanting to make much noise, this time grateful the dome light is out. Placing my hand along the car’s fender, I guide myself to the middle and reach out to the door I know is there. Softly drawing my hand along the wall, I hit the frame and then lower my hand to about door knob height, finding it more or less where I expected. My eyes are starting to adjust to the dark but not enough yet to see. A good thing, because when I open this door I am likely to be blinded.
Turning the knob I push the door open just enough to let in light. It’s brighter than I expected and I’m briefly blinded, though not as bad as it could be. Note to self, my sense of time is a bit off. Thankfully it doesn’t take long for my eyes to adjust. Pushing the door a little more I find I’m in a hallway. I can’t get any visual of the occupants. I squat down to a crouch and extend the Shockwave forward, keeping my elbow close to my stomach, and risk opening the door. I have no idea what I’m going to find so I move quickly, grateful for my experience as the point-man of the tactical team I served in.
The hallway is short and, at the end, I see a boarded up window and the back of a couch. I hear voices talking quietly from around a corner to my right. Two I recognize as the girl I now know to be Ray and one that sounds like the man named Christopher. The other two I do not recognize.
“We can’t have him here, Ray. Take him out and dispose of him.”
“He helped me Christopher.”
“He helped himself. You were incidental.”
“I am the reason he’s in this mess. He had two chances to turn me in and he didn’t take either.”
“And I’m grateful for that,” a second female voice said, “But he knows about the safe-house now. He’s a liability.”
“You want him dead, Bri?” Ray asks.
“No,” another male voice says. “You said he’s an engineer?”
“Yes. He has a Tesla that has to be almost thirty years old. And it runs like it’s new.”
“Chris, that’s someone that we can use.”
“I don’t know,” Chris says.
“Kelsey, I have a feeling about him.”
They are quiet a moment and I stand at the corner, checking my pistol, preparing to turn the corner.
“I trust your judgment, Ray,” the other female voice says.
“No,” Chris says. “We can’t risk it.”
I hear motion and then, “Take this and put him out of his misery. He has no life now.”
“You want him dead, Chris, you do it.”
“Fine.”
I hear the distinct sound of a Boom Rod charging. My heart quickens and rather than be caught hanging out, I spin around the corner, Shockwave searching and immediately see four people standing around a dining table. Their faces freeze in shock.
“I don’t go down without a fight,” I say, quickly finding the one named Chris, the Boom Rod, lit and charged the dead give away. He goes to raise it.
“I wouldn’t,” I say calmly. “This is a Springfield Shockwave. Fully charged, and in the hands of a Echo-Tango.”
“Hank,” Ray starts but I stop her.
“Ray, I heard the conversation. You did your best, now it’s up to me and Chris here.” I look at Chris. “What’s it gonna be, Chris? You willing to die trying to kill me? Or do we talk like sensible folks about what the hell you are up to and how I can get out of here without being wrapped in plastic?”
All eyes turn to Chris. His lips curls and I realize he’s too stupid to be leading people. Or too much of a hot head.
The Boom Rod comes up and I squeeze the trigger. Sounds of modern weapons reverberate through the tiny house as people start screaming. I’m dodging energy blasts, some far too close for comfort, while sending my own to the other side of the small house. Dust falling from the ceiling and the holes blasted in walls, fill the room. I lose my way in the fog of combat, somehow finding myself next to the dead body of Chris, his eyes vacant, his body twisted in a way that tells me his back is broken from my first shot.
I see motion and fire my last shot, which is followed by a grunt. Whomever my shot hit, it was a non-lethal hit. My Shockwave sending two successive vibrations tells me I don’t have enough energy for another shot. I look down at the charge indicator and it is dark.
I never hear it coming. I just feel the impact on the back of my head. Then all the lights go out.
I wake up on a couch. My vision is blurry but I can see well enough to know I’m still in the small house. A soft grown escapes my lips as I feel the pain of an open wound on the back of my head. My hair feels matted and sticky back there. I go to reach up and a voice speaks.
“Slowly, Hank. Don’t rush.”
“Ray?” I ask as I turn my head sideways.
The young black woman sits in a chair next to me. Over her stands a white woman, who looks to be about the same age as Ray, a Boom Rod aimed at my head.
“Careful with that,” I warn. “At this range, my head will explode.”
“I know,” she says flatly. “That’s why I’m standing this close.”
“Ray? What are we doing here?” she asks.
Ray looks up at the other woman.
“Kelcey, please.”
Kelcey looks to consider blasting my head off but let’s out a sigh.
“I know. But he killed Chris and hurt Brian.”
Ray shakes her head.
“He defended himself. We did this. Not him.”
Kelcey nods and lowers the Boom Rod.
“Okay, Ray-Ray. But he’s your responsibility.”
“I’m okay with that.”
Kelcey walks away and I breathe a sigh of relief.
Ray looks at me and puts a hand on my chest.
“She’s my girlfriend so I trust her. She won’t hurt you, now. You need rest and I need to take care of the gash on your head.”
I nod gently.
“We need someone like you.”
“Who’s we?”
“The Resistance.”
Oh no. I didn’t believe they were actually real. I heard stories but never encountered them.
“I’m sorry I hit you. You just went crazy. How did you learn to fight like that?”
“I served in the U.S. Marine Corps and then the Peace Keepers before AI took over.”
“What are those?”
I hate this new world.
“Doesn't matter,” I say.
She nods and begins caring for the wound on the back of my head.
“You have no where to go,” she says, a hint of sorrow and culpability in her tone.
“No. I don’t.”
“We can use someone like you,” she says.
I let out a sigh and close my eyes. Images of Jane flash in my head. I should have taken a note from her book and opened up a brothel like she always said she’d do in a dystopian world.
“I’m sorry, honey,” I whisper as tears fall.
I miss her so much. What else is there to do?
I guess I’m a freedom fighter now.