Amped

  Then something thuds into the boards under the deck. Jim pulls his mouth into a line and stomps his boot against the sagging wood. The blows reverberate like a marching drum.

  “Get up here, Nicky!” he shouts. “You little prairie dog.”

  Covered in leaves and dirt, Nick crawls out from under the deck. He’s grinning, stiff hair sticking up over his low ears. “I know’d it,” he says. “I knew he was here to do something.”

  “Dammit, Nick,” says Jim. “Where’s your mother?”

  “On her way. I’ll tell her you’re lookin’ for her. See you later … Zenith.”

  Nick giggles and trots off into the darkness.

  “Christ,” says Jim.

  “I’ll talk to him about it,” I say, but Jim’s looking past me. Someone is coming. A woman walking slow and relaxed. She carries the kind of gravity that seems to pull light in around her.

  At first, I can see only her pale lips as she emerges from the shadows. Then she pushes dirty blond hair from her face. Sets a pair of bright almond-shaped eyes on me. The glow of every dingy paper lantern hanging on the deck is reflected at me in her eyes, each reflection like a possibility.

  Her temple is clean. She’s not even an amp.

  I set my beer down quick and open my mouth. Ready to spring into action. Ready for something. It’s just that I can’t think of what I meant to do. Or say.

  “Howdy, Luce,” says Jim. “Nick beat you here.”

  “He usually does,” she says. “Brought you guys some supper.”

  She hands over a couple TV dinners, paper curled and brittle from the oven. Jim takes them and nods. His gruff version of a thank-you.

  “This is Owen,” he says. “Friend of mine’s kid. Usual story. Was a schoolteacher, like you. Math or something.”

  “Hey,” she says, extending her hand. “I’m Lucy.”

  I take Lucy’s hand in mine. Force myself to let it go.

  She’s looking up the steps at me and I’m thinking about how pretty she is, and after a second I realize that I’m not saying anything. She grins, amused, I hope.

  Her smile sticks with me for a long time. I guess I was memorizing it.

  “Th-thanks,” I say. “You didn’t have to do that.”

  “It’s the least I can do. Somebody has to make sure the old goat eats every now and then.” She lowers her voice, leans in to Jim. “Are you making another run?”

  “Leaving tomorrow morning,” he says. “Be gone a week or so. Visiting with folks at Locust Grove, Lost City, Tenkiller.”

  “Where are you going?” I ask.

  Lucy draws back and crosses her arms, eyebrows raised at Jim. “He doesn’t know what you do?”

  Jim takes another swig of his beer. Watches the park.

  “He’s our doctor,” says Lucy. “Has been for ten years. The only real implant specialist in Eastern Oklahoma. Goes out to the smaller communities. Without him, a lot of people would be out of luck. Especially now.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” I ask.

  “Not that important,” says Jim.

  Lucy shakes her head. Her eyes settle on mine and I know. It’s important.

  Jim is out here paying his dues. Paying these people back for some sin, real or imagined. He built the Zeniths from scratch and let the military decide what they should do. It makes me wonder what might be inside the Zenith that was evil enough to make him uproot his life and sniff out the original Uplift site way out here in Sequoyah County.

  A band of light scans across Lucy’s face.

  We all turn at once. See the car headlights. Hear distant sirens. And the flow of everyday life splinters and falls apart just like that. People start heading inside, movements shaky with hidden panic. There’s too much bad shit out in the darkness. It’s not safe.

  The crunch from the parking lot is loud enough to cause an echo. Reminds me of a sled bouncing over ice-encrusted snow. Tires shriek. A car is crashing. A dark shape that bounces and grinds to a stop on the edge of Eden.

  A door thunks open. I don’t hear it close.

  Sirens scream in the distance, louder now.

  “We oughta get inside,” says Jim. He’s already up, folded chair in one hand and the rest of the six-pack in the other, a few sweating cans of beer dangling from his fingers by the plastic rings.

  I don’t move. I’m watching the crowd. Parents are hurrying children inside trailers. But some of the grown-ups are staying put. Stone-faced, the men and women of Eden are standing tall and grim.

  The sirens have arrived. Now they cut off. Red and blue lights flash in the parking lot.

  “Get inside, Owen,” says Jim. “Cops run your license and you’re finished.”

  Lucy glances at me, puzzled.

  Just then a kid bursts out between two trailers and stumbles into the central driveway. Huffing and puffing, he trips and falls in the dirt and catches himself with one outstretched palm. Keeps going. Head swiveling, he homes in on the nearest trailer.

  Ours.

  Jim moves to close the door. Too late.

  “Thanks,” breathes the kid, as he pushes past me and storms into the trailer. I notice a burnt-yellow splotch on his temple. Like everyone around here, he has a government-issued Neural Auto-focus. The “government cheese,” as Nick called it. Makes an average kid a genius and a dumb kid average. Mostly, they gave them to the dumb kids.

  “Dammit,” says Jim.

  The kid leaves behind the smell of sweat and grass and gasoline. He slams the trailer door shut behind him. Leaves Jim and me by ourselves on the deck, dumbfounded.

  “See you next time,” says Lucy. She’s striding away, legs straining the cloth of her dress. “Welcome to Eden!” she calls to me, flashing that grin over her shoulder.

  The quiet lasts for one fuzzy second. Men stand gaunt outside their trailers, chests rising and falling, like actors waiting for a cue. The shirtless guy has put on his grease-smudged exoskeleton. He’s feeling it out, standing on one leg with his other foot pulled up behind him like a sprinter stretching.

  I turn to Jim. “What do we do?”

  “Nothing,” replies Jim.

  “Nothing?”

  Jim squints out at the trailer park. Porch lights are blinking off. Eden is going dark.

  “I’ve got to hide,” I whisper.

  “Sit tight,” Jim says as he grabs the back of my shirt. “Run now and they’ll give chase. You get caught with what’s in your head and in five minutes Joe Vaughn will have the country convinced that weaponized amps are infiltrating our trailer parks.”

  I relax and Jim lets go of me.

  A couple seconds later a cop claws his way between two trailers and into the clearing. He’s big. Twice the size of the kid who came through. Dressed in black. Some kind of light body armor. His radio earpiece sprouts a dime-sized, green-glowing ocular sight that’s mounted just below his left eye.

  Jim whispers, keeping his face oriented toward the cop. “Keep your face out of the light and for Chrissake don’t look at him.”

  The cop is ignoring us. Scans the ground. Sweeps his head back and forth like a predator, following the heat differential of recent footsteps. He pauses where the kid stumbled and nearly fell. Cranes his neck and follows the path that Lucy took. Spots her still walking away and then keeps moving along the kid’s trajectory.

  Closer and closer. Right up to our trailer. Our steps.

  The cop stops and brushes his night sight to the side. Looks at me like I’m a piece of furniture. Maybe gauging how heavy I’d be to lift. He absentmindedly pats the radio handpiece that is velcroed to his Kevlar vest, up near his shoulder. Making sure it’s still there.

  “Move,” he grunts, mechanically climbing the splintered wooden steps. I hear motors whining faintly and notice the cop wears an integrated lower-leg exoskeleton in his armor. Nothing fancy, just a stepper to lighten the load.

  I’m not fast enough and the cop plows into me. The solid bulk of armor-layered muscle and compact battery wei
ght sends me grasping for balance. I get hold of the rail just as the cop kicks open the door.

  “You can’t go inside there, sir,” says Jim.

  “I can do whatever I want,” says the cop, and his tone is final. The cop disappears into the trailer.

  He’s right. Legally, we’re living in limbo. I’m not sure there would be any way to prosecute this guy even if he decided to drag us into the street and shoot us all, one by one.

  Jim and I stand on the deck, looking past each other, while the cop bangs around inside. Glass breaks. Muffled shouts penetrate thin walls. A minute later, the cop emerges. Not breathing heavy. Moving slow, without urgency, robotic. He’s got the kid by the back of his shirt, dragging him out like a bag of trash.

  With a swoop of his arm, the cop nonchalantly tosses his captive off the deck. The kid stutters down the steps, scrabbling on skinned and bloody knees. Trying and failing to catch his balance, he sprawls in the dirt. The cop follows, descending one whining electric footfall at a time.

  Nobody in the trailer park has spoken. They just watch.

  Showing surprising spunk, the kid pops up onto his feet. Tries to make a run for it, but the cop is right behind him and gets hold of his hair. Gives the kid a brutal yank, spinning him around with his bleeding hands out and flailing. And then the kid accidentally scratches the cop across the face.

  A collective shudder goes through the people watching.

  The cop pauses, sets his mouth, swallows a lump of anger. Likes the taste. “Mistake,” he mutters. “That was a mistake.”

  The officer shoves the kid back down into the sandy dirt. Drops a stepper-enhanced foot between his shoulder blades. I hear a hoarse grunt as a lungful of air is expelled, raw and involuntary. The kid sputters, breath whistling through his throat. Trying to breathe, I guess.

  “You’re under arrest,” says the cop to the wheezing kid.

  A familiar anger sweeps through me and I take a step forward, but Jim touches my arm. Shakes his head. The old man nods at something in the darkness.

  Seeing it, I get the sensation that I’m falling into space.

  A swarm of neon fireflies stream toward us. It takes a second to realize that each radiant dot is attached to a temple. Blues and yellows and reds. Some color shifting and others sizzling in one hue. Swaggering young amps with glowing, hand-modified maintenance ports approach and surround the officer. It’s a motley group. Some newcomers wear oversized hoodies and ball caps; others are in blue jeans and boots. Cowboy thugs. Scruffy beards and glassy eyes that reflect crisp speckles of neon light. These are the amped kids who hang around Lyle’s knot of three or four trailers. His gang.

  The police officer steps off the kid. His hand darts to the radio on his shoulder. He grabs it and speaks quietly, head turned. For his part, the kid lies on his side with his arms wrapped around his knees. Sucking air.

  “King one oh three. Hold traffic. I’m at Eden, northwest corner. Better start me some cars.”

  Static.

  A flash of white as the cop’s eyes widen. A gap has opened in the sea of bobbing stars. Lights parting for a spreading blackness. Someone is coming through—a man, maybe—someone whose presence is perceptible only by the lack of light.

  “King one oh three. Do you copy?”

  “What’s happenin’, fella?” asks a gravelly voice.

  The identity of the black hole becomes clear. Lyle Crosby.

  “Step away, sir,” replies the cop, still grabbing at the radio handpiece. His thumb clicks the button compulsively. “All of you step away.”

  Lyle steps closer, smirks.

  “Something wrong with your little radio there?”

  The cop slaps the radio back onto his shoulder, but it falls, dangles to his hip by its coiled black umbilical wire. Sssh, it says.

  “Sir, I am serious. I will shoot your ass. I will not hesitate.” The officer reaches down and unbuttons his gun holster. Rests one palm on the butt of his gun. “I will not make another request. All of y’all need to back up.”

  A grimace flashes across Lyle’s face. Something quiet, scary. Surging anger just below the surface. He opens his mouth to speak but stops as a pale hand closes around his upper arm. Lucy. The cowboy turns his head as she whispers something into his ear, gives his arm a little shake.

  “Fine,” says Lyle. “Fine, Lucy.”

  Lyle tugs his arm away, cocks his head, and closes his eyes. A dreamy smile flutters onto his face. He lifts his hands, palms out. The officer draws his gun, drags it from the leather holster with a squeak. Puts it on the high ready. Aimed at Lyle’s chest.

  “On your knees,” he demands.

  “Hush,” says Lyle. “I’m listening.”

  The cop looks around at the neon temples. “What’s the matter with this guy?”

  “Static, Officer,” says Lyle. “All I’m hearing is static.”

  Lyle takes another step. The cop holds his ground. Lyle leans into the gun. The barrel presses into Lyle’s chest, dimples the fabric of his shirt, nosing into lean muscle.

  “Got no backup coming,” says Lyle, opening his eyes. “Your radio’s all jammed up. Can’t you hear it hissing like a rattlesnake?”

  “Enough shit,” says the cop. “Get on the ground! Now!”

  The cop reaches for Lyle’s shoulder, but the cowboy shrugs away like a shadow. His face is suddenly an inch from the officer’s.

  He is speaking to the cop fast and quiet. His voice rises and falls like water over stones. “Two hundred milliseconds. Takes that long just for your brain to tell your finger to pull the trigger, understand? Reaction time. Damn central tenet of mental chronometry. Trigger pull takes a hundred and ten milliseconds with a factory-set pull weight for that Glock of yours. Trigger releases the firing pin. Detonates the primer. Wait for the chemical reaction. Get your explosion and the bullet travels the length of the barrel, about four inches. Whole process takes a second and a half. Shit, man, might as well be an eternity.”

  The kid lies on the ground, watching this unfold from a worm’s perspective. Breathing fast. Mouth open in wonder.

  “You know why I know all that?” asks Lyle.

  “You’re some kind of goddamn freak,” says the cop.

  The crowd of neon thugs has moved closer. Almost imperceptibly. Lyle’s gang is a wall of seething anger. Fast little movements as guys light e-cigarettes, flick empty nicotine cartridges to the ground.

  “Careful talking like that. All by yourself. What with your legs not working.”

  The cop’s eyes go wide. He grunts, trying to lift a leg. Nothing happens. The motors in his stepper are frozen. He slaps his thigh, punches it. Twists at the waist, too hard. Off-balance, he teeters on paralyzed legs, arms out. His gun glints darkly in his right hand as he paws the air.

  Before the cop can fall, his legs come unfrozen. He catches himself. Red-faced, he glares at the crowd. Grabs his gun in both hands and clutches it against his chest.

  “Let me ask you again,” Lyle says. “You know why I know these things?”

  The cop sputters. “I don’t know, okay? Why? Why do you know all that shit?”

  “Because I can dodge your bullets, Officer.”

  Lyle is not lying.

  Abruptly, I wonder just what the hell is perched on my temple. And if Lyle is the only person who can tell me, I wonder if it’s worth knowing. Maybe it’s better to just let it lie dormant for the rest of my life.

  The police officer looks at his own hands, wrapped moistly around the grip of his gun. “You’re out of your fucking mind,” he says.

  The cowboy watches him, not blinking. “You can walk through us like we are ghosts, Officer. You got all the power in the world. But try and tell me power don’t recognize power.”

  The cop isn’t listening anymore. Taking those measured mechanical steps, somehow childlike now, we can all tell that he is trying not to run. He beats it out of Eden. Maybe he’ll come back with more cops. Maybe he won’t.

  Just before I go in
side, I notice the beaten-up kid. He’s sitting in the dirt, staring at Lyle. He’s got this odd look on his face, eyes shining. It’s pretty obvious: the kid’s got a hero now.

  It takes a second to place the last time I saw that look. It was in the eyes of the audience watching Senator Joseph Vaughn give a speech outside his offices at the Cathedral of Learning in Pittsburgh. The day my world ended.

  Lyle just turns and walks off. Ignores the kid and everybody else. Falls back into that sea of floating neon pixels. He still has a dreamy look on his face. I glance past him and notice Lucy. She’s watching me watch Lyle, a concerned look on her face.

  “Be careful around her,” says Jim.

  “Lucy? Why?” I ask. “She’s the nicest person I’ve met so far. No offense.”

  Lucy seems like the most normal, well-adjusted person I’ve met in Eden. Bringing an old man his supper. Probably saved that cop’s life. She’s human.

  “You see goodness in her because you’re good.”

  “Are you saying she’s not?”

  “I don’t know. But it’s worth thinking on. Hell, your life might depend on it,” says Jim. He pulls the half-finished six-pack out from behind his back and dangles a beer at me. “Her name’s Lucy Crosby, son. Lyle’s her twin brother.”

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