Chapter 16
“Emmy?”
“Why are you chatting me?”
“I’m your friend.”
“Not anymore Vidalia.”
“Call me Dalia.”
“Call you what?”
“Dalia. I’ve taken the name.”
“Why?”
“For the same reason you did, Emmy. You taught me.”
“I thought . . . never mind what I thought. Why are you chatting me? You want to apologize for my ruin?”
“Something like that.”
“I don’t want to hear it, Dalia.”
“Didn’t think you would.”
“Then what else can you say before I disconnect?”
“I’m looking for Marco.”
“Don’t say his name like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you know anything about him.”
“I don’t. I have so much to learn.”
“Then why act like you have anything to do with us?”
“Marco’s ideas, your ideas, are bigger than the both of you. There have to be others. I’ve been looking for him. When I don’t find him, I find something else.”
“Like what?”
“Like the lot you described with the tall grass.”
“He wasn’t there?”
“No one was there. The automobile you described was burning. The windows were punched in like when a storm hits a tower before one of the maintenance programmers can run the repair. Only no one could put that automobile back together again. Flames escaped the windows like a picture of one of those fairy tale dragons, giving off heat stronger than any radiant. Warmth up and down my arms. The fire lit the night sky, the patrol could have seen me, and an explosion broke the flapping sound of flame as I ran home.”
“What does that prove?”
“It proves they’re looking for him. The next night, the tall grass had been cut down. Who else but the patrol would have set the fire and cut the grass?”
“Dalia, even if it was the patrol, they could have cleared the lot for any number of reasons. Maybe they’re putting up a new tower. After enough citizens grandfathered in brownstones make the trade, the Mod or a Private builds to accommodate the next round of citizens submitting more completely to the rationale. The burning was probably just a coincidence.”
“You don’t believe in coincidences, Emmy. If you did, you would have disconnected by now. And how does the Mod build new towers? Can’t build an entire tower remotely.”
“Programmers run machines remotely during construction.”
“I haven’t seen a machine capable of a project of that size and complexity. One machine, like a car in all caps, spanned both sides of the street while collecting fallen trees limbs and simultaneously repairing broken tower windows after a storm, but even that one wouldn’t be capable of building a tower.”
“Maybe they enlist transits. I don’t know.”
“Wouldn’t it put it past them, Emmy.”
“Did you see enough transits for a project like that?”
“No, I don’t think there are that many. Maybe the fire scared them off, but I only heard a few coughing in the distance. I thought you said the environment had healed. Why are they coughing?”
“Prolonged exposure, I guess. Marco and I were fine, but we didn’t eat and sleep out there. I don’t even know how the transits collect food and water. Add in the exposure to the hazard, and their immune systems must weaken eventually, expose them to the bug.”
“Speculation and rumors?”
“What else? You’d have to make a life of it to know for sure. The devil you know and all that, I suppose it’s why so few commit to being tracked. If Marco and I were brave enough for that, we’d still be together.”
“Maybe he has committed.”
“He’s not a transit.”
“But they have to be onto him by now. Maybe he left his parents’ place. Maybe he’s become transitory.”
“We don’t know any of that.”
“What about the @?”
“Did you see it? Did you see his sign?”
“No, but I looked.”
“And?”
“I didn’t see it, Emmy. That’s my point.”
“So what does that prove?”
“Why are you so slow tonight?”
“Maybe because I’m tired of being locked up in an institution. You think of that?”
“They didn’t lock you up. You chose freely.”
“Excuse me, I chose to be locked up. When you consider the alternative, it’s a distinction without a difference. You heard the dialogue. Tell me your theory on the sign.”
“Marco loved you. Presumably still does.”
“Tell me something I don’t know.”
“If the patrol weren’t onto him, his sign would be everywhere by now. There’d be a trail leading you to him. I didn’t see a single clue. He doesn’t know you’re in here. Can’t know. You said he swore off tech, that his parents didn’t know who you were and that he would never contact your parents. If not for the patrol, Marco would be looking for you everywhere by now. But I didn’t see the @ once.”
“That’s a theory.”
“And?”
“And you’re probably right.”
“So the patrol is onto him?”
“Probably.”
“Aren’t you concerned?”
“Of course I am.”
“Then don’t you want me to find him?”
“Marco can take care of himself.”
“I thought you just said you were concerned.”
“I did. I am.”
“Then why wouldn’t you want me to help?”
“Look what happened last time you tried to help.”
“My intentions were different then.”
“And what exactly were your intentions, Dalia?”
“To protect you from him.”
“And now? What are they now?”
“To give hope. To give you both hope. To make amends.”
“Or to learn what he has to teach you?”
“Those ends are not mutually exclusive.”
“Stay away from him, Dalia.”
“I haven’t even found him yet.”
“I said, stay away.”
“I don’t want to take him from you.”
“Who said anything about that?”
“Why wouldn’t you want me to help if not for jealousy?”
“I have my reasons.”
“Like what?”
“Like, like, like.”
“Aren’t we getting old for that?”
“I suppose.”
“Why wouldn’t you want me to help?”
“Because you can’t, Dalia. You can’t help.”
“You don’t know that. You can’t prove the non-existence of a thing. I can only try and fail.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of.”
“Or succeed.”
“Less likely.”
“What is the worst that could happen?”
“I don’t know. I’m too tired to use my imagination. Just stay away from him.”
“You’d rather he wander around out there without knowing where you are? You’d rather he risk being picked up by the patrol? They could allege he’s committed new crimes against reason since the agreement and then force him into dialogue. You said yourself he’d never submit fully to the rationale. They’d track him and commit him to life as a transit.”
“Then I’d join him.”
“By the time you could join him, he’d have the bug.”
“Then I’d take care of him.”
“You’d catch it, too.”
“The bug is not contagious.”
“Living transit, you’d come down with it eventually.”
“We all have to die sometime. We aren’t machines, and we aren’t tech. That’s how the Mod gets us to commit to the rationale, by making us fall in love with things that don’t die. They get us wishing we were more like flat screens and minis.”
“So you’d rather die than let me help?”
“I’m going to die eventually.”
“Stop being a nihilist, Emmy.”
“Living fully is the opposite of being a nihilist. That’s all I want to do when I get out of here and reunite with Marco.”
“Then why not give yourselves a chance to live fully for longer? Why live transit and cut life short?”
“We’ll do fine without you.”
“Not Marco, he’s wandering around out there looking for you, exposing himself to the hazard while you’re in here enjoying radiant when it’s cold and coolant when it’s hot.”
“I wouldn’t say I’m enjoying it.”
“Then what would you say, Emmy?”
“I’d say, do whatever you want. It’s still a free City for those willing to exercise their rights. Just leave me alone.”
“What rights?”
“The ones citizens fought to preserve. You’re the upper class student. Look them up.”
“Why don’t you give me a tutorial?”
“Why don’t you give me some privacy? There. There’s a right for you. Now let me exercise it. I’ve got some nightlies to do, and I don’t want to think about you looking for Marco while I’m running probability and statistics.”
“So, you want me to look for him?”
“If I told you my thoughts, they wouldn’t be private anymore. Just do what you’re going to do. I can’t stop you.”
“The patrol could.”
“Vidalia, Dalia, whatever you call yourself now, you’ll have to weigh those risks for yourself. They give me enough probability drills in here for the both of us. I’m not interested in picking up more nightlies pro bono.”
“I think you already told me your thoughts.”
“I didn’t tell you anything.”