Summer '05 Quillt

Between the end of May and end of August, 2005, I edited, and Mr Red, Mr Grey, Mz Violet, Mr Maroon, Mz Black, and Mr Green constructed, this partial-story which grew out of an initial 100-word patch which I, Mr Orange, wrote.

CHAPTER ONE

What a glorious mindsprain! As the sweat on my back cools, unreliable air currents slosh memory eddies on top of my pure, unconfused intoxication. The smell of fluoride treatment day in the school cafeteria co-mingles with beach. Wedding shoes lap against last year’s excitement of traveling through the Tobbo Shops, which becomes distant laughter. Or was that a real sound?

No pain. Still standing even though my feet are cut off. The nightsky-light reflection through the broken cloudbanks in the water (where my feet once were) catches my attention. Is the intense brightness slicing between my legs a meteorite or is it just the blood pressing against the back of my retinas? The memories dissolve into a checklist of clinical observations: The vertigo from the undulating scene; the push and pull of the tides; my testicles, trembling as the cold water conspires beneath them; the fear of distance; the benign panic; the umbilical cord to the shore.

Eyes seek a point of reference. Skin dutifully reports its findings to the brain. Always, the inevitable undercutting of my romanticism. I could write a book about it, out here in this black oval.

I wonder. How are the others dealing with this? At once I wished my mates the best, while simultaneously I hoped for their failure. I loved them all, but...

With my luck clutched tightly in my right hand, I buckled down and increased my concentration; calmed my breathing patterns. My thoughts drifted to my mates. Juniper, with his speed, could think out a pattern while eating through his mandatory banana quota. Lozenge-glove was the natural fighter of the group, with a mean streak that usually left his vanquished opponents resentful.

That our tests were singularly solo efforts usually left Loz at a loss for inspiration. But not me. No...I have special talents. An implant here, a microchip there; Nipper and Loz have no chance. My processor scrolled through the drop-down items. Complete reconstitution, check; weapons, check; rucksack, check. I fished a banana out of the supply pocket and ate it whole. Potassium helps clarify my thoughts.

Fucking water; I hate being wet. But it’s not salt water; less corrosion. I flipped the heat sensor down over one eye and scanned the shoreline. Red blob at my two. Light Green blobs at five and seven…there was only supposed to be the three of us. I needed answers. Now.

A Shadow brought forth a cautionary read: the Red was hot.

Although only a few seconds passed, I couldn't afford to wait. I spawned a Shadow, requested adrenaline and extra muscular oxygen, and braced for the answering rush. Instead, it returned a warning: the banana hadn't processed sufficiently; it would do what it could — I hoped it would be enough. As energy built, I checked the seal-patches covering my exposed components. Shadows rushed to give me their final reads and I brushed them aside as I launched myself towards a point halfway between Greens and the Red on the shoreline.

As I rocketed across the horizon — which was now developing luminescent purple streaks throughout — my mind drifted to last year's prescient Tobbo Shop excursion with Juniper and his partner Alta-Shearson. Although Nipper was always a brilliant strategist, he was never blessed or augmented with the ability to fly. Since I could naturally levitate at subsonic speeds, I didn't have much need for a high-speed aerial sled, although I did ride along when they deliberated over, and test-drove, the various makes and models.

It was also on that day that we encountered Lili Coleopter — sweet, tragic Lili — for the last time. Lili epitomized the cutting edge Flight and Fight Program: refusing to refuel unless ordered, forcing mind to create matter. We coupled once; recovery took three days. We planned another bout that night and I felt ready. Maybe I'd request an exclusive partnership.

Over the test field her sled plummeted in a non-tactical move. I heard her scream in my head.

She hit, shattering force-equals-mass-times-acceleration. No fuel for shields — nothing keeping the body together on impact — the body I knew intimately, scattered over two kilometers. I kept her eye and Shadows for luck. Shadows? Angels? Guardians? The more eyes the better.

So it was that I, with poor Lili's eye and its cargo of broken Shadows — only their software halves; no wetware in eyes — found myself speeding inland to intercept the, now insanely fast, Red.

Lili's dead Shadows could never survive outside her system. But as I clutched the eye against my palm interface, my own special Shadows (complete with memories of Lili's warm body) tenderly power and probe. Her pitiful half Shadows feebly provide uncorrectable answers: nothing but numbers; and soon mine return, pregnant with flight skills. Sickened and probably dying from their brief interaction, I pray they survive long enough to download any viable data that was extracted. I need more information on Red. Where does the speed come from? What is it after?

I pick up a Shadow. My vision fades out, the periphery fading to black and leaving only a hazy point of light. Something is wrong. I sense the proximity of the next Shadow. A data dump of binary numbers fills my head and my heart rate skyrockets: moderate — damn it — back in sync.

God it hurts! Slow it down, collate, what did the Shadows learn?

A machine, Red is not enhanced. It’s just a machine. Well, a machine I could deal with. This was six tons of AI destruction bound for the mainland, clocking speeds I was going to need more than a banana to match. Pain flared in my head again, my speed dropped considerably.

Nipper in my ear: Do you see that?

"I'm feeling it, and it feels like —" I saw the flash of light too late to brace for the sonic boom, which crashed over me. Nipper in my ear again, Shadows streaming data, trying to compensate for the sudden deluge of information...it was too much. I felt myself falling

CHAPTER TWO

“Come here.” He pointed to the floor in front of his feet.

The floor was gritty under my palms. Wood grain tattooed my knees.

His cuffs fell perfectly, breaking just over his shoes, denting the crease slightly.

“Look at me.”

I drank in the pinstripe against the charcoal, the blinding white of the starchy poplin and the frosty, blue paisley noose. Understated. Everything about him hid just below the surface, but his eyes could freeze your soul. Green, grey, yellow swirled through his irises; demonic eyes that got inside you.

“Go ahead.”

I barely felt my fingers as they fumbled at his fly. The thirsty space around us drank in the zipper’s whistle, and I wasn’t certain it was open until he grabbed my left wrist. I looked up, and my world was all eye.

“Keep going,” he said, lifting my fingers to his waistline. “You’re doing fine.”

My wrist dropped from his grasp, my eyes from his face, and I went for the button. I had it, and with the tips of his fingers under my chin he lifted my gaze to meet his.

He smiled. Fangs? No, of course not, but he was more frightening when he smiled.

I could feel alien fingers of thought tickling synapses, causing involuntary reactions in me that would have been humiliating under other circumstances. Sigh, shudder, moan. "Yes… hot… more…" He was trying to break the last firewall, the one that held sanity and will and self. Tickle, seduce, humiliate the rest of me, but that wall was going to hold. Please, it had to hold. Behind that firewall, the claxon overrode commands like CONTINUE and reissued its initial command of RUN. I was trapped between the rock of our collective will and the hard place beyond his zipper.

The zipper opened, exposing a glistening iridescent surface which danced before me. I reached through the open port face, the live contact surface of my left hand touched; I jacked-in. Information flowed...

"Yes. You see how it is," he began, "how the others are no longer so important." I licked my lips, as my Shadows unpacked his incoming data and integrated it into my structures. It was useful, but might come at a price.

"I'm flattered, but," my breath caught, as a spasm of excitement spread. A Shadow had unearthed an image of us... together. "You... planted that."

"I wanted you to see."

“If this is your best attempt to seduce me, then it’s a waste of time.”

“But you’re here, you wanted…”

“I wanted information and was prepared to do what I felt was necessary to get it. You showed your hand. Now, I’m leaving you alone with it. Game over.” I stood, interrupting the connection, and winked at him. The extracted files were already stored behind more firewalls than he could conceive. “It would have been fun breaking you down — I planned to make you cry, one way or another. By the way, grandpa, nice suit; who’s your tailor?”

The others...Shadows of Shadows...flowed around me, anxious. In lifting his information, I inadvertently gained ghostly digital revenants of past conquests and they now swirled about my ports, searching for a way in.

"You can't do this," he whined, already losing some of his electric-blue glow. I mistook his tone for concession.

"I can ... and have".

Turning my back was a mistake I instantly regretted. Red Shadows, powerful bits of anti-code that exist within and without only the most powerful programmers, slammed into my body and I felt the crackle of carmine current invade the only open ports – my pores. Clearly I had violated some kind of unspoken guideline. New to this particular android espionage sex fetish scene, I was obviously too unsophisticated to submerge myself convincingly in the narrative.

An older woman knocked loudly on the window in the control room and the surrounding milieu disintegrated like a little iridescent waterfall. All that remained afterwards was the hardwood stage, a variety of projectors, and the seated 'user' with his helpless, flaccid penis hanging out of his fly. He quickly zipped himself up and shot an angry glance at the woman behind the glass.

"What's going on?" he asked indignantly.

"Game over, Sir, once you use the safe word the hologram ends within five seconds. Didn’t you read the pamphlet?"

"Can you run it again?"

"Certainly, would you like to use the same form of payment?"

He waved her off.

"Thank you for patronizing the Walk a Mile Holo-Boutique. Please come again."

He heard a snort of laughter just as the microphone clicked off. 45 minutes...might as well grab a bite. Exiting, he winced at the bright day, already planning out his next scenario.

"Yeah, I definitely don’t want to be the girl next time."

A passerby sped past...and he stepped back awkwardly into the arch twisting his ankle sharply. The pedestrian shouted something, undoubtedly derogative, lost on the light breeze. He was getting used to it — the cat-calls, the glares, the way mothers clutched their children a little closer — but it still hurt. The voyeurism of the booth attendants was forgotten within minutes of his first time, and after the first electric thrum of real pleasure — not the synthetic variety found in PharmaKiosks — he was hooked on the thrill of bait n' switch and sex without consequences.

"Sir", came the voice behind him, "you forgot your card."