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  The message wouldn’t be presented within Lander’s vision as text for him to read. That was a primitive notion of technology. Another one his father liked to discuss at length. Reading was slow. Cumbersome. The PNU allowed William’s message to flow directly into Lander’s own thoughts. No visual clutter. No reading.

  “I hope you have something important to say,” said Lander, his voice flat.

  “I just thought you might like to know that there’s a real person in the apartment with you.”

  “So considerate of you.”

  “Hey,” William said, holding out his hands, “I’m just trying to prevent an embarrassing situation…for both of us.”

  “You can join if you want. You know I’m always willing to share.”

  William raised an eyebrow. “So there’s more than one, is there?”

  “No,” Lander said, shrugging his shoulders. “But you should see her. The most gorgeous woman on the planet.”

  “That’s not saying much. Now that the earth’s population is one-hundred-thousandth of what it was before Desolation.”

  “She’s more beautiful than any woman who ever lived.”

  “You do realize that she is not even a real woman?”

  Lander grinned stupidly. “I know. She’s better. She never nags me, she’s only there when I want her, plus she looks, smells, and feels just like the real thing.”

  William didn’t respond. They’d had this conversation before. Lander was addicted to the simulated companions—the SimComps—that his PNU enabled. The PNU applications could augment any of the user’s senses. If the user wanted to see a field of flowers growing on his floor, the PNU could do it. Trick the brain into believing it saw flowers. The user could smell the flowers and feel them brushing at his ankles. Lots of people, like Lander, used this capability to make their fantasies become as close to reality as possible.

  And it was all possible thanks to the PNU.

  William sat down in one of the wingback armchairs across from the sofa. He didn’t have the energy to get into a debate about the virtues—or lack thereof—of the SimComps. He didn’t even have the energy to get up and get an energy drink. Truth be told, there were worse preoccupations involving the PNUs. He was all too familiar with those as well.

  “How are things going with your current project?” William asked, his tone casual.

  Lander leaned back on the sofa, clasping his hands behind his head. “That’s classified information. But I will say that your father is pleased. Yours?”

  “Same.”

  Like William, Lander was another one of his father’s tools. Neither of them had any dissolutions about that. Of course, that wasn’t their official job title. Each had a cover project that the rest of the engineers and scientists believed they worked on. And, as a strict rule, neither was allowed to discuss their work with the other.

  So long as they did what William’s father asked of them, they basically got to do whatever they wanted. If ever they wanted to break off their arrangement…well, William didn’t like to consider that.

  That didn’t change the fact that William almost always discovered what Lander was working on. And Lander discovered what William was working on. This time, though, things were a little…different. William couldn’t quite put his finger on what that difference was.

  “By the way,” Lander said, “Adrianna stopped by.”

  William groaned. “Fabulous.”

  “What? I don’t know what your problem is, mate. As far as the real deal goes, they don’t get any better than Adrianna.”

  William shook his head. “Have you ever considered that there’s more to the opposite sex than…” He hesitated.

  “Sex?” Lander offered.

  “Never mind. I forgot who I was talking to.” He stretched, yawning again. Then he stood. “I’m going to go eat something. I can’t remember when I ate last.”

  “Eat later. You need to relax. Come on, I have just the thing.”

  Ignoring his friend’s invitation, William walked wearily over to the kitchen. He had no interest in Lander’s form of relaxation. Besides, he couldn’t relax, even if he wanted to. He wished he understood why. Maybe once he completed this latest assignment, he’d be able to relax and feel like everything was normal again. Deep down, though, he knew that wasn’t the answer.

  SIX

  Despite her fatigue, Rylee found only a few fitful minutes of rest before her grandfather was rapping on her bedroom door, calling her to breakfast. Rylee beat her head against her homemade pillow—a few bits of rags sewn together, then stuffed with discarded lint from the wash house.

  So that her grandfather didn’t come barging in to check on her, she muttered a semi-intelligible “I’m awake.” Then forced herself to sit up, biting back a scream of pain that burned in her throat. Once upright, she exhaled and just sat for a moment, breathing in and out, eyes closed.

  You can do this, Ry. Ignore the pain. Ignore the pain.

  Making as few movements as possible, and gritting her teeth the whole time, she undressed. The cold air groped at her bare skin, and she started to shiver. No electricity at nights meant no heating. She stuffed her torn jacket and her pants into the box that served as her dresser, and started the slow process of pulling on her spare clothes.

  A second knock rattled her door. “You awake in there?” her grandfather called from the other side.

  “Just a minute.”

  Trying to ignore the pain in her arm, she pulled on her faded green sweatshirt. A Seahawks sweatshirt. The one she refused to wear except on wash days. Maybe the sweater would distract her grandfather from asking about her jacket.

  The oversized sweater tended to put her grandfather into nostalgia mode. Taking him back to the days before Desolation had destroyed everything he’d known. Back when the Post Desolation Reconstruction Alliance was a city called Seattle. Some people still called it by its pre-Desolation name. Others called it the Puget Sound, referring to the ocean inlet whose waters formed the western border of the city. Most simply called it the Alliance. Her grandfather remembered the days before the Alliance better than most. He could talk about Seattle Seahawks football games for hours, once he got going.

  Rylee knew practically nothing about either the Seahawks or football. Or even the way things had been before Desolation. She had only been two years old when most of Seattle had been destroyed by a massive earthquake. As far as the rest of the world was concerned, Seattle was lucky. It had been one of the last areas to fall—to truly experience the wrath of Desolation.

  Rylee finished lacing up her black leather boots, then walked out of her room, making sure to close the door behind her. Her grandfather was seated at their small kitchen table, hunched over a chipped plate, dolloped with a clump of cold refried beans. She knew they were cold because they had no means to cook anything.

  Her grandfather looked up at her and frowned. His grizzled hair was disheveled as usual, and a tuft of it stood up on the side of his head, trained by his pillow during the night. Except for being a bit shorter in length, his beard matched his hair, both in sloppiness and color. Rylee imagined her own dark hair didn’t look much better.

  Forget showering in the morning. Her grandfather often spoke of doing so before Desolation. Those were in times when the water came from the pipes steaming hot. In the slums, if the water came out at all, it was as frigid as jumping in an ice-covered lake this time of year. She only forced herself to shower once a week—or two—because she eventually grew tired of her own stench. She called it her two minutes of torture. Like rubbing fistfuls of snow all over her bare body. She shivered at the thought.

  Her grandfather showered more often than she. But then, her grandfather was probably the toughest sixty-year-old she knew. A Norm his age had to be. Or he would have been Deprecated years ago.

  Those hard, chiseled lines of her grandfather’s face frowned as he took in the sight of her. “What did you do?” he said, digging his spoon into the beans and taking a
nother bite. He hadn’t asked as though he were concerned or even that interested. But there was definitely a subtle edge of accusation in his voice.

  “What do you mean?” she asked, taking her seat at the table and biting back the jolt of pain that shot through her leg as she did so.

  “You never wear that sweater, you knucklehead,” he said gruffly. “Not unless you’re trying to butter me up, or distract me from something.”

  Rylee felt her insides burn a little. She took a bite of the cold beans and immediately swallowed. It was amazing what you could eat when you didn’t give your taste buds time to process the food. “I ripped my jacket,” she said, making her voice sound casual. “It was a stupid accident. I’m going to see if Serghei can patch it.” At least, that last part was the truth.

  Her grandfather grunted, then took a swig of water from his cup. “What kind of accident?”

  Rylee shrugged. “Caught it on something, wire or something at work.”

  He grunted again.

  Rylee’s stomach knotted up inside. And her breakfast wasn’t the cause. This was her grandfather, her only family in the whole world. And she sat there, lying to him.

  “When I was a boy,” he said, “parents often chided their children for carelessness with their things. ‘Clothes don’t grow on trees’ they’d tell them. Now they don’t even come out of factories.”

  “I’m sorry, grandpa,” she said, her voice showing the sincerity that she felt. “I’ll try to be more careful.”

  Taking two more spoonfuls of beans, Rylee stuffed the remainder of her breakfast into her mouth, drank some water, then rose to leave.

  “I’ve got to get to work,” she said. She was more than anxious to get to the Workers Square to hear if there was any news about last night’s events, and to avoid further interrogation about her jacket.

  “Aren’t you forgetting something?”

  Midstride to deposit her dirty dishes in the sink she stopped, and let her shoulders droop.

  Why does he insist on doing this?

  She turned back around and seated herself again. “Right,” she said. “I forgot.” Couldn’t he let her go just one morning without this ritual?

  Clearing his throat, her grandfather reached into his pocket and drew out a palm-sized book. Its brown leather binding was as worn and creased with age as her grandfather’s skin. He riffled through the delicate pages until he came to the spot that he’d been looking for. It was a book he called the Bible. Actually, as he liked to explain, it was just part of the Bible. The New Testament. And he insisted on reading a verse of it to her every day.

  Rylee tapped her foot on the floor as he began to read. But before he could get a word out, the sirens started blaring.

  * * *

  Norms flooded Workers Square, their necks craned toward the platform at the north end. The air still pulsed with the sirens, demanding the attention of all denizens of the slums. Above, the gray clouds hung low, like a blanket of smoke threatening to smother them all.

  Rylee scratched the back of her hand as she and Preston took in the scene from a rooftop. Other Norms lined the rooftops of the other buildings surrounding the square. Otherwise, she and Preston wouldn’t have risked standing out so much.

  Not every Norm in the slums could fit into Workers Square, no matter how tightly the people crammed together. Even though the sirens meant everyone must come to the square. But enough would be there to be effective. Effective at conveying whatever message the CA desired for them. That message would reach the ears of the others, like her own grandfather, who ignored the sirens, from the mouths of the many who were present.

  Inside, Rylee secretly wished she possessed the strength to stay away. More often than not, a call to Workers Square meant some alteration in rationing, an extension of work hours, or some method of further burdening the Norms. Other times, it was merely for the CA’s propaganda machines to bolster the CA, to celebrate the gains he had made in rebuilding all they had lost.

  Order will save us.

  That was the mantra that had been pounded into her skull since she was old enough to go to work in the fields. It accompanied all messages like the one she feared was coming.

  Order will save us.

  She repeated the words in her mind, and scratched at the back of her hand. Just being near Workers Square brought them unbidden. Sometimes the acrid words almost reached her own lips.

  Workers Square. As a child she had come to the square every morning. She was only six when she first went to work—weeding, pollinating, planting—until her fingers and knuckles bled. That was the rule, though. The order of things. In her mind, she pictured her first day waiting nervously in the square, before piling into the back of a large truck crammed with mud-sodden children. That was the day she met Preston. He was a seven-year-old, with a year’s more experience. Even at that young age, he had shown confidence and leadership. He had helped her more than she could say in those first few weeks.

  She and Preston were no longer field workers. Like many children, they had moved on to apprenticeships once they turned ten. Preston worked as a mechanic, repairing the decrepit fleet of trucks, construction vehicles, and farming equipment that the Post Desolation Reconstruction Alliance operated. Rylee worked as a journeyman electrician. Rarely did she have reason to come to Workers Square these days, where the trucks picked up field workers, scavengers, loggers, and other laborers in the mornings.

  “That green looks…impressive on you,” Preston said.

  Rylee looked down at her sweatshirt and frowned. She had almost forgotten she was wearing the hideous thing. “Impressive?” she said, raising an eyebrow at him.

  “Sure,” he said, grinning. “It makes you…stand out.”

  She jabbed him with her elbow. “Stand out? Wow, thanks. You sure know how to make me feel better.”

  Preston was laughing too hard to say anything back. Despite herself, and the pent-up anxiety she felt, Rylee let herself smile a little. Preston was so…serious most of the time, stolid. At times like these, you would think he didn’t have a care in the world. He did it for her. He always knew what she needed. How could she help but love him for it?

  The drone of the crowd below suddenly changed pitch. Rylee turned her gaze toward the square’s platform. A line of men garbed all in black, with tactical vests and assault rifles, marched across the platform. Regulators. They halted so that they formed a protective barrier between the crowd and the platform. A moment later, a figure stepped out.

  Garrison Pike, Chief Regulator of the Post Desolation Reconstruction Alliance. He walked with his head held high, his movements fluid and precise. If his walk and his slicked hair didn’t give him away as an Elect, his clothes did. A long forest-green coat, fastened to the top of his throat with silver buttons—not a single patch, stain, or tear to be seen.

  A hush fell over the packed crowd.

  The knot in Rylee’s stomach doubled. Presence from the Chief of Regulation could only mean one thing.

  “Fellow members of the Alliance,” he said, his hand clasped behind his back. Though he spoke without a magnification device, his words amplified and echoed through the square and adjoining streets with unnatural force. Serghei had commented on this apparent phenomenon more than once. The Elects, he had explained, could wirelessly interface with amplifiers mounted around the square. That was the gist of what she understood, or cared to understand. Serghei, of course, could talk about the Elects’ abilities for hours.

  “Members,” Garrison Pike repeated, not an ounce of warmth in his words. “You have been summoned here this morning so that you might witness justice being served.”

  A murmur rose and fell from the crowd below.

  “Last night,” he went on, “two of our members were murdered in cold blood on these very streets.”

  More murmurs.

  Rylee’s heart began to race.

  “Two members who have served the Alliance with much vigor, and who might have gone on to do great
things...”

  Why was he going on about this? In the last two years, Regulation had never responded like this to the killing of an Elect. Sure, they had performed investigations and issued warnings to the people of the slums. Nothing ever became of it, though. The Regulators knew precisely for what purpose Elects came to the slums. Any who came deserved what they got. If not worse. Why this, though? First, an arrest. And now a public denouncement by the Chief Regulator.

  “The Alliance will not tolerate such heinous crimes. This was not simply an attack on two individuals, but an attack on all of us. An attack on all we are trying to rebuild. An attack on the order. And thus we charge Vincent Bowen for the murders of Private Ian Gyles and Commander Michael Pike.”

  The pronouncement hit Rylee like a bullet in the chest. She rocked back, nearly tripping over her own feet. Eyes wide, she turned to Preston. Had she heard correctly? His eyes, too, gaped wide.

  It was true, then.

  I killed the Chief Regulator’s son.

  SEVEN

  Now she understood the prompt backlash from Regulation. The Chief Regulator’s son, a Regulation squadron commander. She’d killed the Chief Regulator’s own son.

  Rylee closed her eyes and squeezed them tightly together.

  What did I do?

  She should have let him get away with Lexi. That was him she had pursued on the cycle and then killed after Preston had barricaded him. She felt very little doubt of that. A squadron commander. It explained the tactical vest that she suspected he had worn. And why, even for an Elect, he handled his pistol so deftly.

  “Order will save us,” Garrison Pike declared, voice booming through the square. Order will save us. Few good things bore the CA’s seal of order. “Those who commit such crimes rebel against that order. They threaten our very survival.”

  Pike made a curt gesture, and two Regulators moved in response. A few seconds later, they hauled a gangly figure onto the platform and forced him to his knees in front of the crowd. The figure looked out at the crowd, hands bound behind his back, mouth gaping.