Machinations (6 page)

“I don't think he cared about the investment work at all,” Samuel says. “Between you and me, I think he was just here for Disney World.”

I laugh despite myself. “Poor guy comes for sand, surf, and Mickey Mouse ears, and ends up in the freezing cold. That's some rotten luck.” Why do I remember these sorts of things? Trivial, unimportant things. “So, how did Ulrich manage to get from sunny Florida to the middle of Alaska?”

“Funny thing about fighting a war against machines,” Samuel answers. “After a certain point, nationality doesn't seem to matter. The American military started accepting volunteers. As long as you could hold a gun and were human, you were welcome to join up. I don't think I have to tell you, Ulrich knew exactly how to hold a gun.

“Anyway, as far as I understand it, when the military started to retreat, he came with them, and when the structure broke entirely, he along with a few others fell back to McKinley.”

“How did they know to go there?”

Samuel looks at me as if he's forgotten who I am—or who I'm not. “We picked up their emergency signal, and you called him on a SAT phone. Gave him directions on how to get here. I don't know any more than that; it's all either of you ever told me.”

There's so much more I want to ask him about, but something catches my eyes—movement where there shouldn't be any.

“Don't look now, but I think we have company,” I say in a barely audible whisper. Samuel tenses. “Run on the count of three.”

“Rhona—”

“Don't argue!
One, two…three!
”

We take off in separate directions. Whether the thing is machine or flesh, it will now have to make the crucial decision of who to chase. If the machine is part of a lower echelon of AI, this sort of strategy may buy us valuable time to escape. Scouting drones aren't usually programmed to think through complex situations. That isn't to say they don't get lucky from time to time, though.

I know it's the best tactic, but I still don't like having to split up. I chance a glance back, and don't see Samuel anymore. My heart thickens in my throat. But then my ears fill with that awful
whirring
sound, and I keep going. Maybe it's all I know how to do: keep going.

The grumbling machinery grows louder, closer, and I'm running out of energy.

Several times I stumble, scraping my hands on rocks camouflaged by snow and ice. Each time, I get up. Bleeding, haggard with grief and fatigue, I get up, allowing frustration to fuel me. In my head, I try to hold a picture of Camus's face from my dream.

I want so badly to see him again. More than anything.

Keep. Going.

But the machine is catching up, and it sounds like more are coming from the stretch of tundra to my right. Something is on the move out there, kicking up twin clouds of powder. My eyes begin to sting even more, not only from the dry, cold air, but also the white, fluorescent landscape. I'm forced to look away.

A sharp pop, like a cork released from a bottle. I barely have time to think
What?
before a hard pinch buckles my right leg. I go sprawling, my head smacking against compacted snow.

For a few seconds, I'm unable to think, let alone move. A small, pitiful noise climbs up from the back of my throat and snaps me out of it.

Can't stay here. Gotta move.
This thought is quickly followed by the despairing realization that I don't have anywhere else to go.

Numbness creeps up my leg. Some kind of tranquilizer? It must be. I can't recall the predator-class machines ever carrying tranquilizer darts before; sort of defeats their purpose. Maybe it's some new kind of scout? No. That doesn't make sense, either. Amidst the panic and fear, my brain can't help but recycle this phrase.
It doesn't make sense. Why not just kill me?

“Worry 'bout it later,” I mumble to myself.

Hiding may not be glamorous, but if it keeps me alive, I'm willing to try it. With the strength of my arms alone, I pull myself toward a small opening in the shadow-drenched earth next to the trees—
some kind of animal's burrow?—
dragging the dead weight of my leg behind me. Drops of blood dot the snow behind my struggling, wriggling body. My nose. My stupid nose. I'm Rudolph in that scene where his nose gives away his and his friends' position to the Abominable Snowman of the North.
Bumbles,
I think that's what they called him. It's been a while since I've seen that movie…

I decide this is by far the stupidest train of thought I've had yet. I
must
be dying.

Again.

Through no small miracle, I get all the way inside the burrow—only to discover it's not a burrow at all.

Instead, the ground turns to crackling tarp beneath my gloves. Overhead, the roof sags under the weight of snow, looking close to collapsing. The tent is so dark I no longer see my breath, white and frantic in the air. The only indication of color is a small wedge of fluorescent orange on the ground in front of me, interrupted by the black shape of my body. It's a little like being swallowed by an orange—and a lot like crawling into a casket.

I clamber over some bumps in the middle of the tent, all the while straining to hear the sound of the machine. Where is it now? What is it doing?

Distracted, it takes me a moment to notice I'm crawling over the corpse of a young man. I inhale sharply, rolling off him, nearly choking on my own spit. My eyes water from the cold and the fear.

Bodies. Three mummy bags of various colors, lightly dusted with frost. A family? Or simply strangers, gathered together in accordance with the age-old idiom,
safety in numbers
? No way to know now. I lift my gloves from the cold, slippery material of the bags, expecting blood—or some indication of how the machines murdered them—but there's nothing. No savage marks in their sleeping bags, no holes ringed with black gunpowder. Just eyelashes lying sharp as icicles beneath the young man's closed eyes.

The cold killed him, and the others. Cold or starvation or both. Suddenly, hiding no longer strikes me as such a great idea.

Outside, the wind hustles through the trees, and beneath the ambient noise, metal shrieks against metal. Every step documented by a crunch in the snowpack.
Whir-whir-whir,
is the noise the machine makes.
Ee-eye-ee-eye-o.

I'm grateful the others have their faces turned away from me. I pretend they're equipment instead of people as I begin shoving-slash-rolling them toward the entrance of their half-buried tent. “Sorry,” I say to the young man and his dead buddies. Not even out loud, really. The word passes soundlessly through my chapped and chattering lips.

A few obstacles near the entrance won't stop the machine from finding me, but maybe it will slow it down. Buy me time.
To do what?
asks the tiny, frightened voice in my head.

Something.

Anything.

But even as I slide the last corpse into place, my arms turn rubbery as a chew toy. They tingle almost pleasantly, as if shot with that anesthetic the dentist gives you before drilling cavities.
Always hated the dentist.

I clutch the EMP-G to my chest and flex my hand. My fingers don't feel like fingers anymore—not mine, anyway. The tips are dead when I press them to my cheek, trying to revive some sensation in the nerves. Nothing. Still, I can make them work enough to pull the trigger. That's what's important. “Won't take me without a fight,” I murmur through a half-paralyzed face.

Whir-whir-whir.

Crunch.

Crunch.

Crunch.

Closer now. I almost laugh from the tension.

I don't even see it. The machine tosses the mummy bags aside like doll packaging and reaches in, yanks me out into the crisp sunlight. All the while, I'm firing like a madwoman. The machine releases me suddenly, and if I could run, if I could make my stupid legs work, I would.

But I can't.

Instead, I stare, wide-eyed and dry-mouthed, as light and shadow fall over the machine's still, metal face. It's even more disturbing up close for its carnivorous look. A cool, raptor glare, designed to inspire fear, with optics red as the eyes of a monster. They are frozen in their last adjustment, half-extended toward me like a camera's zoom lens. Everything being recorded, analyzed, and sent back to the higher echelon—the intelligence that rules the machines.

The optics click, and I feel the movement like a foot in the gut.
Back online.

I fire again, and continue firing every time the thing reboots itself, praying the charge lasts. The cold has taken its toll on the weapon, however, so it seems unlikely I'll be able to get more than ten bursts out of the thing. Ten times the ten seconds it takes for it to reboot means I have roughly a minute and forty seconds left to live.

A minute and thirty-nine now.

I try to get my limbs to work, but they just
won't.
The best I can do is flail around in the snow, gaining an inch of distance away from the machine at a time. It'll never be enough for an escape.

A minute and ten seconds.

Just as the machine starts back up, and I fire one of my last rounds, an axe slices through its middle, causing sparks to fly. The machine doubles over on itself, its core processor exposed from the attack. The axe comes down several more times to make sure the machine is rendered completely inoperable.

The world sways as I struggle to stay up on my elbows, my vision becoming elastic as a fun-house mirror. I try to concentrate on the stranger clothed head-to-foot in extreme-weather apparel, face hidden behind a white balaclava.

Samuel
? I think, but then I remember Samuel never wore a balaclava. Or carried an axe.

Somewhere in the distance, I still hear the sputtering roar of machinery, only now I dimly recognize the sound as belonging to a snowmobile.

What I don't hear anymore is the whirring, and it's such a relief the tension drains from my body. In the absence of adrenaline, I pass out.

By the time I wake, my surroundings have changed entirely, replaced by white floors and white walls.

Again.

At least I'm not naked this time.
Although I do notice I'm wearing a change of clothes. The outfit is comprised of a snug, rusted-orange blouse and tan khakis just loose enough to be comfortable. In fact, both the shirt and the pants fit entirely too well, as if tailor-made for me. I put the two together. This was part of my wardrobe, back at McKinley.
Is that where I am?
It seems too much to hope for.

I waste no time getting up and investigating. The room I'm in looks more like a holding cell than a bedroom: small, with very little in the way of furniture or decoration. There's only one door, no handle. Beside it, however, is what looks like some kind of intercom.

I walk over and push the black button, speaking into it. “Hello? Is anyone listening? I'm awake now, just so you know…”

No answer. Not even the faintest scratch of static. I'm not even sure it's still functional. Not a good sign, but I push the intercom button several more times anyway, to be sure. Or else to annoy whoever's ignoring me on the other end.

Once I've worn out that diversion, I look around to see what I've been left with to entertain myself.

Just as the answer seems like it will be big, fat diddly-squat, I come across a mirror. Thin as a sheet of paper and reflecting the opposite wall, it camouflages itself well. I don't even notice it until I pass by and catch a flash of red. My hair sticks out like a sore thumb against the room's bland color scheme.

I step back slowly, like it's some big reveal.

It
is
the first opportunity I've had to get a good look at my new, cloned self. For all I know, I appear deranged, hideous, inhuman. I could be a monster.

I take stock of my features like I'm reading off a quality-control checklist for a Rhona Long doll. Everything seems to be there—two eyes (green), average nose and mouth, round face. Perfect teeth, too (all without the agony of having braces well into high school). But my freckles are different; they're darker, splotchy, and only cover one side of my face, like a Dalmatian's spots. I'm not sure whether to feel curious or repulsed. It's an interesting look. Certainly…new?

“Could be worse,” I say aloud to my reflection. “We could have ended up a cyclops or something.” Samuel had said cloning wasn't textbook science.

I decide the freckles aren't so bad.

I'm still analyzing them when the door slides open with a hiss of depressurizing air. A woman enters. I recognize her, but have to search for a name. She's wearing her platinum hair in a simple braid that trails down her back, and has her hands clasped in front of her like she's holding something important close to her chest.

The door shuts behind her almost immediately, sealing us in together.

She doesn't speak, but instead begins signing with her hands. The first time she does it, I'm afraid this is going to be one long, awkward conversation. But she makes the same gestures again, more slowly, and understanding starts to come back to me. By the third effort, I know exactly what she's saying.

You look just like her.

“I've been getting that a lot lately,” I reply with my usual cheek, and she smiles, so either she's only mute, or she's deaf and reading my lips. My gut tells me the latter.

Do you remember me?

That's the million-dollar question, isn't it?
I'm grateful that this time I can actually find a name to put to the face without having to ask or be told. “Hanna?” I say, only a little uncertainly.

Her eyes, a rich, hazel color, fill with glossy tears. Tall and long limbed, she crosses the room in two strides and embraces me like a long-lost sister.

It's as if someone has unlocked a vault in my mind, and I withdraw a few memories from the last five years, since I've known Hanna. We met after the end of the world, but our friendship wasn't defined by it. I remember good times, like meeting in the cafeteria during dinner and how she would do the most hilarious impressions of past celebrities, fictional characters, and even our colleagues. She did a particularly excellent imitation of Camus, accent and all, which he always responded to with a stiff smile.

But I also remember the hard times. When Hanna lost her hearing during an attack, and how we learned sign language together. I hadn't wanted her to feel alone. Now she's here, returning the favor.

I squeeze her a little tighter.

Samuel said your memory was—
she pauses to think, then makes the sign for
broken
—
I was worried
.

“Samuel,” I say, recalling the forest and the machines. I'm almost afraid to ask about him. “He's safe, then? I mean, it sounds like you've talked to him. Is he all right?”

Hanna smiles patiently and verbally says, “Slow down.” I realize my lips are moving too fast for her to read—nothing more than a slur of concerned syllables.
He's fine,
she adds with her hands, showing her preference for signing. I remember the first few months after the incident and how she hated being unable to speak properly, always too loud or too quiet. So much of what had made her
her
was the character of her voice. Yet somehow she managed to redefine herself. I wonder if I can do that, too.

“Can I see him?” I ask her.

The smile disappears from her eyes and she shakes her head.

“Why not? You said he was fine…”

Yes
, she assures me, although I think she's leaving out some key details.
More or less.

“More or less? What's that supposed to mean?”

“He's being debriefed by the council.” She says this aloud, maybe because she doesn't think I'll understand the obscure signage for it.

Debriefed by the council.
I know what that's code for: trouble.

McKinley's political structure and history trickles back to me, somewhat disjointed, like suddenly remembering a dream in the middle of the day.

This is what I recall: The council was something Camus and I established as a poor man's war cabinet, maybe two years into the war, after the United States was no longer so united and its states no longer belonged to humanity. Its purpose was to provide a little democracy, order, and most importantly, leadership, back when our ragtag group of soldiers was hardly more than a militia playing at war. But since then, it became the central governing force for more than just McKinley base, as we discovered other cells of human resistance. If McKinley is the strongest arm of the North American war effort, then the council is its brain, telling it when to move and where to swing its fists.

For Samuel to be called before the councilors for a debriefing did not bode well—for either of us. At a time when no one was stepping up to the plate, Camus and I became leaders almost by default—me more so than him, since I'm the people person, and the council was partly my brainchild—but I don't know what changes have occurred in my absence. Nature abhors a vacuum, and if I learned anything as the daughter of a politician, it's the slippery nature of power. Which leads me to wonder: Am I still considered McKinley's commander? Do I still possess the deciding vote, as before? Or has that rank passed on to someone else? Someone less…dead? Technically, if I am still commander, does the council have any right to hold me here at all?

Before I press Hanna for answers to these questions, or devise a plan to help Samuel out, my mind shudders to a violent stop.

“Camus is here,” I realize aloud. Of course he is. Where else would he be?

Hanna nods slowly.

My throat feels tight. “I want to see him.” No. What I really want is to know why he hasn't already been to see me.

Her mouth scrunches up as she gives another shake of her head, this time indicating no. I know that's the answer I should accept, but it's not good enough. I haven't trekked across half of Alaska and nearly died several times over, only to be denied and given no explanation why. I tell Hanna as much, and ask if I'm to be a prisoner.

No,
she answers. “Not exactly.”

I'm glad she can't hear my tone, because it's antagonistic. “Then what,
exactly,
am I?”

Her expression teeters between guilty and sad.
That's what they're trying to figure out.
Even soundlessly told, it hurts to hear. It's like I'm some kind of dangerous creature that needs to be kept away from the public.

“I need to speak with Camus,” I finally say, over the lump in my throat. I have it in my head that everything will work out fine if I can just
see
him, speak with him. He'll know me. “Please, Hanna.” My voice cracks, and once more I'm grateful she can't hear me.

An eternity stretches inside me, while Hanna formulates her decision. Then she turns away, looks up and into a corner of the room.

A moment later, the door slides open with a miraculous exhaling sound.

She motions me to follow her to the now-unlocked door, and I do so without hesitation.
Do you still know how to get to the war room?
she asks.

I nod. Even if I don't, I expect I'll be able to find a sign or something.

“Don't expect a warm greeting,” she warns before giving me one last hug and gently nudging me toward freedom.

Just outside, there's a bald man about Hanna's age, midthirties, standing guard. Rankin, I think his name is. It's hard to forget a dome that shiny. I worry Rankin's going to lock me back up, but after flashing me a smile and a cavalier salute, he pretends not to have seen me at all.

I have similar experiences as I navigate the unending labyrinth of hallways and corridors that make up McKinley's innards. People openly gawk, but no one tries to stop me. Some stare with harmless curiosity, gazes tempered by disbelief. Others I think might be a little afraid of me.
Rhona Long,
they must be thinking.
Back from the dead.

Not entirely true, but not entirely false, either.

Head held high, chin up, I walk like I belong here. This is my home. I belong here.
I belong here.
I keep telling myself that, and it encourages my stride.

The layout of the base is octagonal and complex, but not without reason. McKinley base was built prior to the war, as a spiritual twin to the former United States Pentagon, even before the latter was destroyed. It was unoccupied until we arrived, since the president and his cabinet were slaughtered during the surprise attack on DC, and everyone else down the political line of succession was systemically hunted down and exterminated by the machines. They never had the chance to retreat to the safety of the mountain. It was only a stroke of luck that Camus and I, after traveling to Seattle, managed to evacuate along with a few of the only people alive who knew it existed. At least, that's the story I've been telling myself, based on what little memory I have of those early days. Until I'm told differently, it might as well be the truth.

If memory serves, McKinley has five levels, with meters of rock and ice between each level to cushion an attack from the surface—although, thankfully, that's never been put to the test. The mountain above, Denali—formerly Mount McKinley—functions not only as a formidable natural defense, but as a further precaution against detection by the machines. So far, anyway. I'm not sure why knowledge of the base hasn't leaked, when other, more important things have, but I try not to look the gift horse in the mouth.

Even with minimal wrong turns, it takes me about fifteen minutes to find the war room—conveniently located on the same level. Double doors and a pair of soldiers standing guard are all that separate me from the council inside. And Camus.

I pull back around the corner before the soldiers have seen me. Suddenly, I'm nervous. Unsure. But I have only my impulsiveness to thank for this predicament. I nibble on my lower lip, chewing through my doubts. I have a few seconds to decide what to do, but ultimately, my impatience wins out. I'm done waiting for answers.

I approach the two men standing diligently at their posts.

“Camus sent for me,” I tell them. It's useless to try and trade on my own name until I know what my position is here.

“No, he didn't,” says the man on the right. He's enormous, built like a Grecian statue, all dark marble and stone-faced. It would be easy for him to deal with a half-baked clone like me, but instead he just stares, watchful.

“Okay,” I confess. “He didn't. But he will. Just consider me fashionably early.”

“We have our orders. No one goes in or out without priority security clearance,” adds the other, shorter one. His voice is surprisingly quiet, soothing even, better suited to a psychologist's office.
And how does that make you feel?
There are more words in his eyes, unsaid. Both of them are looking at me expectantly. It feels reminiscent of those dreams where you're taking a test you haven't studied for. What am I supposed to do here?

Security clearance
…

There's only one person I can think of with the right access, who's available and willing. Guess now is as good a time as any to figure out where I stand. “Do I still have priority clearance?”

“Commander Long's clearance is still active,” the statue says.

“Right.” I look at the identification console on the wall, then back at the guards who have remained remarkably passive, considering I'm kind of an escapee. “Do you mind?”

“If your clearance is denied, you'll be returned to your cell.”

“I'll take that as a no,” I say and press my hand to the palm reader before they change their minds. I feel a slight prick at the tip of one of my fingers, and wait for it to process. Three pairs of eyes watch the black screen as the swirl of DNA is computed.
I hope Samuel wasn't lying about that whole genetically identical bit.