Zeroworld, p.21
Zeroworld, page 21
“We don’t have time for this now, bud.” She had her back to me and was fiddling with the door handle, like it was locking her in.
“Please, Zoe. Just tell me something. Who are you?”
She turned, a sad smile on her face, then she slumped to the floor.
“You will hate me even more, Madeline,” she was using my full name, it had to be serious.
“Zoe.”
“Fuck. Okay, okay.” She looked up at me, hesitating, I thought she wasn’t going to say anything, then she did. Very quietly at first, “I’m Lisa. Lisa Jarvis.”
Lisa fucking Jarvis, she was Lisa fucking Jarvis. Lisa had been my assistant, when I was alive, she organised my life when I was corporate and responsible. But she had been a criminal. Embezzlement, from me, from my company. It almost broke me, well financially at least but it could have stopped my plans entirely. I almost wasn’t here. I had put in her in jail, for decades she was going to be in jail. How could she be here?
“Fucking Lisa!” I wanted to punch her in the face, but she was sitting down against the wall, and I would have had to bend down to reach. I contemplated kicking her.
Zoe spoke, Lisa spoke, “they sold it as atonement. I would be free, and I could make it up to you by helping you but…”
“You had to be dead,” I answered for her.
“Yeah. Assholes. I had to be dead. They didn’t give me time to say goodbye to anyone. They needed someone in here and Zoe was an opportunity, what happened to her, that was their opportunity.” She was reluctant. I think that she realised that whatever she said would make matters worse, there was nothing she could say that wouldn’t.
“Hang on. Back up. They killed you? Couldn’t they have just put an active copy of you in here?” I had guessed what she was about to say but I couldn’t quite believe it was true, or maybe, given everything that had happened in those early years, perhaps I could.
“No, they couldn’t, you know what the rules were, you couldn’t be in two places at once and given everything that happened it was a short-term problem to dress up my murder as a suicide but a much larger one if I was still out there too”.
She was right, ZeroFlex was on thin ice back then. It was illegal to have a ‘living’ copy of yourself anywhere until you were dead, that had been one of the changes after the early debacles with downloadable intelligence. I ran my fingers through my hair. I wasn’t sure what to say. I had wanted Lisa to go to jail but not murdered! And it was eons ago, at least for me, whereas in reality, it was still a fairly recent incident.
“I was here originally just as your foil, your Zoe, but over time I proved myself, and they started trusting me. I was fairly unique, a ZeroFlex employee in here, who knew everything or at least more than most. That had power too, I’ve never threatened them, but they knew it and I knew it. They gave me more to do to keep me in check as well I think.”
I laughed. It was fucking hilarious. I couldn’t stop laughing. My throat was getting sore, my eyes were watering, I doubled over and collapsed to the floor next to Zoe.
“Fuck it,” I said.
“Wwwwhat?” Zoe was in shock that I wasn’t in shock or beating her up.
“I mean, it’s ridiculous! Of all the people, you’re Lisa, that bitch, the person I made sure went to jail for twenty years. And yet you’re trying to get me to forgive you whilst all of this time making things much, much worse. It’s an absolutely fucking dreadful apology.”
She nervously chuckled, unsure of herself, “You’re not angry?”
“I think I’ve done that, Zoe. Maybe I just need to process this. Maybe I will be angry. I don’t know. For now, I wish I hadn’t asked you, and I’m going to keep calling you Zoe. I’ve just gotten used to that again. Let’s pretend this never happened. Can we do that? Maybe in the future we can have this out, but for now, just for now, can we not?”
“Sure, bud,” she said softly. The relief was all over her face, “sure.”
“There is one more question though, that I think I need to know the answer to – the people that work for you, the security guys – who are they?”
“Just hired help,” she sighed, “can’t be relied on, or trusted, they’re not ZeroFlex, and they can be bought. They’re just mercenaries, essentially, people who were in here who would be able to handle the job and needed the money. Although they were far less capable than I had expected.”
And with that she got up and we left to find Alex. I would need time to catch my breath, I wasn’t sure I could ever fully trust Zoe again, but I could trust her motives, in the same way we could trust ZeroFlex. We both wanted the same things. Find Mike, stop the bad guy. After that, we would see.
We didn’t leave right away. We had equipped ourselves with phones before we left the den, burner phones that we would use then discard as soon as we could. I texted Alex the address of a building opposite the safe house and when she pulled up on a fancy looking motorcycle, and once I was sure it was her, I phoned her and told her to come in. This had meant that Zoe and I had had to take it in turns staring out of the window but thankfully Alex had not taken that long. She was impressed with the precautions I’d taken and told me so. Then as she pulled off her leather jacket, she asked Zoe, “How safe are we here?”.
“We think we’re good, but I don’t want to hang around,” I answered for Zoe, and she simply nodded her agreement.
“Okay, let’s be fast then.”
I told Alex what we had discovered and showed her the letter and she told us that she had tracked down the car. It was parked just off the alley that had started this all, the one with the red door. Alex had never been there before, but she had recognised it immediately from my description. The door had mostly stayed the same colour as the others on the street, but it did go red once while Alex was watching when someone she didn’t recognise went in. It was obviously an easy way of establishing which was the correct building, but it appeared most didn’t need it. And the pure sameness of the buildings on the street made it a weird but quite effective security measure. Although, if someone witnessed the colour change, like me, then it seemed entirely counter-productive, unless maybe the door moved? At this point I thought that this was not a particularly ridiculous leap of logic. Alex had stayed watching for as long as she thought was safe and had seen several people come and go. She’d seen Anna go in but not Dave. The door only changed colour once, so perhaps it was an ‘on request’ kind of deal?
“What now?” I asked.
Alex was about to say something, then paused. She was bobbing on her toes, obviously thinking of the right way to say it.
“What is it, bud?” Zoe asked, I’d noticed she’d used ‘bud’ with Alex too, it meant she liked her, I’d only heard her use it with me. Or maybe she was about to betray Alex as well. Must put that out of my mind, Madeline, I thought.
Alex finally blurted it out, “We need to go on the offensive. We need to take a risk. For the first time, I think we might have an advantage and I don’t want it to go to waste. Madeline, you need to wear your armour and I think we need a horse.”
“Hang on, did you say a horse?”
“Wait.” Zoe said before horse acquisition became a tangent. “I agree about being on the offensive, Alex, but I don’t think that means horses. We need to try something smaller first, still big but not all-of-our-cards-on-the-table-big. And we need to find out who the other magic users are, and if they allied with the Accountant or not.”
Zoe seemed very sure of herself all of a sudden, bright again, none of her earlier conciliatory tones.
“What did you have in mind, Zoe?” Alex asked.
“I would like speak to my receptionist; I have a few questions for that bitch about loyalty.”
I bit my tongue, tasted blood shrouded in irony, but kept my mouth shut. It was a good idea and I agreed that I didn’t think we could risk a frontal assault, we needed to be sneakier.
Chapter 34
Perhaps we wanted to get moving before we changed our minds but the three of us headed straight out to find the car Alex had arrived in. Then I remembered she’d arrived on a motorcycle. A small bit of light thievery later, and we were driving a beige sedan. I often wondered why the cars in Zeroworld weren’t all high end? I guess it helped the economy having levels of aspiration even when the differences were simply different coding, it’s not as if the materials were any more expensive. Alex wanted to drive, and no one objected. We started heading back towards the alley with the red/not red door. I had no idea what we were doing, or how we were going to pull this off.
“Guys, what are we doing and how are we going to pull this off?” asked Alex. I sighed; thankful it wasn’t just me. I was sitting in the back of the car in the middle and leaning forward in between seats. I felt like a kid trying to come up with play activities that would entertain the adults. Zoe, on the other hand seemed to be much more definitive in her thinking.
“Alex, when you saw her, was she on her own?”
“Nope, not even close and who is to say she’s still there?”
“Fuck.” Zoe snarled, she seemed to be showing a bit more aggression than I was used to. “Well, we don’t know that she’s left, so it can’t do any harm to head back there and wait and see if she comes out, see who she’s with and take a view. Maybe we’ll get lucky, and it will be three versus one.”
Maybe we will, I thought, but I wasn’t optimistic. Was three of us enough? Our last run in with Anna, oh God. I didn’t want to think about what she’d done to Tristan.
“Zoe, it’s too risky, we don’t know what she can do. And Alex and I will be worried about protecting you. I can’t lose anyone else, even frenemies.”
Alex looked confused. At least as far as I could tell from my perspective in the back. I didn’t think I was that out of touch with modern slang, was I? Maybe the fact I called it modern slang meant I was. She had been a good half century younger than me when she’d entered Zeroworld, so it was entirely possible that I was a smidge out of touch.
“I know what a ‘frenemy’ is, Maddy,” Alex said with exasperation. She was ruining my internal monologue with her perceptiveness. “I’m just trying to think how we minimise the risk.”
Alex slowly steered us back towards the red door distractedly looking back at me in the rear-view mirror and across at Zoe, so much so I was concerned that we were going to crash on a couple of occasions, ZW physics notwithstanding. She agitatedly banged on the wheel at traffic and swore repeatedly. Zoe just smiled next to her at first, I thought she was just amused but then I realised she had an idea. As it turned out, it was a very obvious one.
“Bud, you need to wear the armour!” she exclaimed excitedly. “It’s the only choice, Mike said it would protect you and it will serve as an excellent distraction.”
“Wasn’t that my idea? And what if it doesn’t work?” Alex, voicing my thoughts. That was happening way too much.
“What choice do we have? We are all going to be in harm’s way. Madeline will at least be wearing armour that puts her in a better position than either of us. The armour was a good idea Alex.”
Alex and I reluctantly agreed. The next rather sizeable problem was how the fuck was I going to put on armour in a moving car?
“I think we need to pull over onto a side street, somewhere secluded so you can change,” said Alex. Wait did I ask that question out loud?
“There’s somewhere,” pointed Zoe. We pulled into a parking lot, took a ticket and Alex guided the car to the top level. There were no other cars parked, so we decided that this was as good as anywhere. I took the armour out of my pocket and unshrunk it. It was at this moment that it dawned on all three of us that we had no real idea how to put it on.
Chapter 35
I was wearing a long-sleeved t-shirt and underwear before we decided that leggings might help so we added those. We shared the magical burden between Alex and I. What followed was the equivalent of building self-assembly furniture without instructions. Shouting, some tears, parts left over, and we almost resorted to violence on at least a couple of occasions, but eventually I stood there, resplendent. Unable to move, but fucking resplendent. I resplended. The sword that Mike had provided was, however, overwhelmingly ridiculous. What was he thinking? It needed to be something else. I was trying to lift it while I was thinking this, and it dropped to the ground. No, I was still holding it, but it was lighter. But something dropped. I looked down and there was a round shield laying on the floor and in my hand was a curved, short sword. Much more my style. It was as if it had known my wishes and accommodated them, none of my magic required.
“That wasn’t me!”
“What do you mean, bud?” Zoe was so used to what we could do by now the fact that the sword had changed in front of her eyes didn’t halt her stride at all.
“I mean, I thought it was too unwieldly, but I didn’t change it, it changed itself.”
“That’s promising,” said Alex, looking thoughtful. “That means that at least we know it is magical, to some degree. This crazy plan might just work.”
“Only if I can move. I can slowly waddle towards her at the moment, I’m not sure that is much of a distraction.”
Regretting saying that, almost instantly I could feel the armour shifting around me. It’s difficult to describe but it was like it absorbed my undergarments, the clothes underneath it and it melded itself to me. It wasn’t painful exactly, it felt like the air was pushed out of my lungs while it adjusted itself. A parasite adapting to a host. I looked down, it looked the same, yet different. It was even more closely shaped to my body, I was worried it was almost revealing, but it was still amour. The chainmail was no longer visible on my upper body. What had been panels with exposed areas of chainmail on my sides was one moulded piece of metal carved around me and down my legs, an armour jumpsuit but including my feet. The helmet was still detachable, and I was at this moment very glad I didn’t need to pee. It was time to go. Go get Anna that is.
The armour moved like an extension of my body; I could barely feel it. I didn’t feel naked, more like I was wearing tight Lycra or a wetsuit. I could feel it there, but my movement was completely unrestricted. And it was light, no weight at all. And it remained gorgeous, the runes I could see were very much still intact. The helmet maintained its shape and its plume. I decided I would have to put it back on once we left the car, I’d struggle to squeeze in the back otherwise. I should have called shotgun.
Alex drove the car down the ramp of the car park and in what seemed no time at all we were stationary at the alley with the red door, parked at the entrance to it so we could make a speedy getaway. Alex and Zoe got out, visible, obvious. I stayed in the car in the back. We waited. And hoped.
It didn’t take long. I was beginning to think we were just a little lucky. I would soon revaluate.
Anna was on her own. Walking up the alley towards us. Initially oblivious. Lost in thought. Then she saw Alex, then Zoe, still in a costume. And she started running. Not away from them, towards them. We had changed the distraction and it had worked! Oh fuck, it had worked. She was fast, superhuman speed. She wasn’t a blur exactly, I could still see her running towards us, but it was like a speeding car, accelerating until she was in front of them.
I’d been so mesmerised; I hadn’t had time to react. I’d just sat there in the back of the car. Staring. Staring and not fucking acting like I should have been. I came to my senses as I saw Alex materialise a shield of pure blue light and punch Anna with her other hand. Or at least try to, she missed. That almost never happened. But Anna was so quick. I also thought our plan was at best incredibly reckless, how was this sneaky? Trying to grab her on the street when there were pedestrians all around us. Some who had ran as soon as the fighting started others who had stopped and gawked at the powers on display. I, thankfully, had stopped gawking and had managed to exit the car. But it was too late.
Anna had somehow managed to push Alex to the ground, and a gun was in her hand. I didn’t register what type of gun it was because she’d shot Zoe. Zoe had screamed and collapsed. Why had she used a gun? Is one of the questions I should have been asking myself but all I could see was Zoe, blood seeping from a wound in her stomach. I saw Tristan lying there too, a mirage but he seemed real momentarily. I almost called out to him. I charged at Anna, shield in front of me, sword aloft.
Electricity shot from her hands. I should have died instantly but I was just pushed away, landing on my back on the ground. The electricity had disappeared into my armour. It had been absorbed by it and it now sparked with power. I could feel how much as if I had absorbed it too. Anna was standing over me ready to hit me again, but on this occasion, she didn’t have time. I sent all of the power she had sent at me back at her but with much of my own too. She was incinerated. A woman screamed. There were still onlookers. Anna was gone. Entirely. I had killed her. No, I had extinguished her, completely. Expelled her from this world. My world. There was a moment of quiet then I was consumed by the enormity of it. I had killed her.
“Maddy, we have to go!” Alex. “She’s alive but we have to go.”
She wasn’t alive, I had incinerated her.
“Maddy!” she was right in front of me now, ready to slap me but it wasn’t necessary. I reacted and grabbed Alex’s hand. Grabbed Zoe’s still on the floor. Then we disappeared. Vanished. We appeared in the den. Safe?
Minutes later, Zoe was fine and up and walking, cured by Alex and her power in the den. I was sitting on an armchair in one of the many materialised rooms. I was still wearing my amour. I had no idea how to remove it.
Then, Zoe was sitting next to me. Holding my hand.
“Bud, you saved me.” I didn’t acknowledge her.
“Madeline.” I turned my head slowly looking at her, Zoe smiled slightly, maybe relieved I was okay, but I wasn’t okay. Why did she think I was okay?
“Madeline.” She said again, stroking a hand through my hair. “Thank you. You saved me. You had no choice. I’m alive because of you. You shouldn’t feel guilty for that.”
