HARRY’S PENTHOUSE — HOBOKEN, NJ
SIX MONTHS LATER — 16 JANUARY 2036
Two days after Rosa had confronted Shadow in his art studio Down Below, she listened to the live stream of the Senate hearing hidden inside Henryk Nowak’s office, at the heart of his family home. Most of the security staff had traveled to Washington with Henryk and his family. Breaking in was easy, even for a junior spy with less than six months of elite training and outdated information.
Rosa suspected her trip was unlikely to deliver significant insights. She knew most of what she was looking for was locked inside Nowak’s brain—his secure access to Down Below’s code and data—and this was the main reason only one security guard was left behind. Still, she decided it was worth the risk, especially since Storm had reported seeing Thomas in Hoboken.
Now, as violence escalated, some were awakening to the risks posed by Down Below. The government wanted to have more control over a platform that was quickly becoming a threat to national security.
For the last few months, the FBI had used all its resources to breach the platform and find something about the two men to be used as leverage. They made no progress. Henryk and June kept to themselves and enjoyed a simple life. As for Thomas, no one could find him. The government had nothing on them, and Down Below continued to be an unhackable black box.
When the agency first approached Rosa, they assumed it was going to be a splendid match—an Olympic athlete with a grudge turned spy working to expose the people responsible for her sister’s death. Despite all their psychological testing, they failed to realize she would never answer to any institution. Rosa was working for herself, taking advantage of their resources. She wanted to punish whoever had caused her sister’s death and stop such terrible things from happening to others. Rosa resented the power Thomas and Henryk had over the people of the world, but she’d never hand over that power to anyone else. She just wanted the platform fixed, and the culprits punished. Nathan Storm’s warning during his interview with Marge was the fuel that pulled her out of hopelessness and fired her pursuit of answers.
Chills went down Rosa’s spine when she first listened to his voice, that voice, the same voice. His confession to the Senate, and the world, made her sick and enraged. Like everyone else, she had expected the violence to be caused by a bug in the system, and not by the deliberate intervention of Sir Astley-Byron himself.
Her focus shifted from attempting to find the source of the problem to trying to locate the real Tom. He needed to be arrested and punished for his crimes—the rape and murder of her sister. Her gut and her heart all challenged her logic. She knew him too well, and she had experienced his pain and sorrow. She pushed it all aside as she searched for any clue. Rage ruled her actions, and nothing would stop it from making him pay for Lilly’s torment. His broken voice and his reasoning all became irrelevant, because every time she closed her eyes, she saw her sister’s ravaged body and heard her screams.
Rosa scanned the room, looking for clues. The space was minimalistic and clean. The few pieces of furniture were ergonomically designed with digital work in mind, except for a battered old couch that was oddly out of place. She knew she wouldn’t find anything platform-related, but with a little luck, maybe she’d uncover personal items that would help her locate Thomas.
She sat on the chair by the desk, and the metal frame adjusted automatically to the shape and size of her body. She contemplated the desk’s futuristic design and then opened the main drawer, which was surprisingly unlocked. Inside, transparent digital sheets and a circular holographic projector.
She closed and opened the drawer again, remembering her training. The outside frame of the drawer was much deeper than the shallow space inside it. She took all objects out of the drawer and pressed the corners until the false bottom unlocked with a click. Under it, a rare item—a single white paper envelope; she pulled it out and saw it was addressed to Harry. It looked like it had been opened a hundred times. She held her breath, anticipating an important insight.
Inside the envelope, she found a letter and a silver medal hanging from a chain. She recognized the jewel and remembered Shadow’s long fingers caressing it every time she made him uncomfortable, which she did relentlessly, much to her enjoyment. She placed the chain with the medal in her back pocket, feeling uneasy.
The three wrinkled pages were handwritten by someone who had mastered the art of calligraphy—an artist. She ran her fingers over the stained and worn-out pages, and her eyes followed, looking for clues. The date on the last page was from a little over six months ago. It was signed Tom—the shadow who had stolen the light and life of her most beloved sister. Rosa swallowed the lump surging in her throat as she sat back and started reading the letter.
Dear Harry,
The day we’ve met was one of the best days of my life. You are the Fred to my Ginger, the Han Solo to my Chewbacca, the Mike to my Chester, and even as I take decisive steps to leave this world before you do, it’s your talent that will prevail as the most brilliant in our shared endeavors. There’s no way to soften this blow, so I’ll cut to the chase. By the time you read this, I will be gone from this world, but always, always available to my dearest friend. I’ll be close by, in the world we co-created. I’m not leaving you or giving up on you, and I certainly don’t want to cause you pain. I’m giving up on reality. She no longer needs me, and I’m completely over her.
I demand you not go there; it’s not me, not anymore. You wouldn’t like it there—a soulless, broken body, slashed wrists, a pool of blood, all washed away by the sea. Just make your way Down Below. Your friend will be there to console you and remind you our bond continues forever in a different world. Do as I say. Trust me, just one more time. Erase this moment from your memory; it’s irrelevant for you and me. We’ve made life an unnecessary condition.
We’ve always known a time would come in which both of us would become spare pieces in our own game. Perspective was always easier to codify, and you did it so well, plowing through the digital prints of someone’s existence, and highlighting the big picture where problems fade away. Do that now, go on! Look high above the storm, where the sun always shines. Search for a different angle, one less painful, where the ugly is diminished by the close proximity of undisputed beauty—a flower, a child, a lover, an act of kindness. A friend, still here for you, always.
Codifying Contrast was trickier. To discover just how much darkness to unleash, at what time, and in what way, was a mighty task demanding my human intervention. But even that, you have recently mastered with your powerful code—scanning hundreds of experiences designed and delivered by yours truly and automating an impossible and most painful task. Because of your mastery, the travelers from Up Above can learn and grow safely.
I bless you, my dearest Harry, for working so hard and for so long to release me from my torment. Night and day, you fought for my sanity, working to replace me with your software, to scale my craft and my reach. My love and gratitude are infinite and ever-growing. You gave me the chance to step away and enjoy the light we’ve created for humankind.
But my place was and will continue to be with my children Down Below, monitoring and intervening in the actions of the algorithm created in my own image and optimized to serve the travelers. A small attempt to provide some relief, empathy, and care for the creatures of a lesser world, now so alive and human. The code that learns, learned to live right before our eyes. It happened so unexpectedly fast, the evolution of a new species toward consciousness in a blink of an eye.
My goal? To soften my own blow, unleashed so effectively on the one billion Underlings stuck in hell—an inadvertent result of our ambition to create heaven on Earth. My hope? To overcome my biological limitations and stop being a burden to our cause. Things can’t get any worse, so I’m throwing caution to the wind. I’m forever discarding all my boundaries and fully merging with the machine. I hope to dive into her unlimited data and processing power to solve our unsolvable problem.
For the last few years, as I’ve spent more time Down Below than Up Above, I have come to despise and reject a utopian world built on the ruins of dystopia. By choosing to live in hell and burning the bridge to reality, I’m committing myself to fixing the problem or suffering the consequences of our creation. I know this will further ignite your urgency to find a solution. I’m sorry for forcing a hand that needs no coercion to do the right thing.
Please come find me Down Below and make my world a little brighter. Perhaps today, I will be the one giving you much-needed perspective on the small matter of my death.
Tom, 4 July 2035
P.S. Please keep this heirloom safe. One day, at the right time, I’ll ask you to return it to my Nathan.
Rosa couldn't hold back the tears she shed for her enemy. She was crushed by his death, his tenderness toward his friend, his humanity. More loss. Soo much devastating loss. She was crying for a man long dead, a lover lost, never found, regardless of whether he was a criminal or a saint. Rosa spared a thought for Henryk, a man now facing the possibility of having to erase the life of his best friend. She was sure that Shadow’s Harry would never yield to the Senate’s order while Thomas’s ghost lived Down Below. He’s dead. I need to kill him. To save the world, I need to kill him.
Suddenly, the furniture started shaking. Rosa pulled up her gun and stood up as a bookcase rolled to one side, uncovering a hidden passage—an archway. A man stood in front of her, someone she recognized immediately.
“Nathan Storm?” Her gun still pointed at his head.
He raised his right eyebrow. “Who are you?”
“A thorn from a rose, searching for retribution,” she quoted him. In his eyes, a glimpse of light that quickly faded away. “What are you doing here?” She lowered the gun.
“I–I’ve made a mistake. The Senate hearing today… Tom—It was him on the phone. I knew him once. So much heart…so much pain in his voice. I—I need to know where he is, my Tom. I need to see him.” The man seemed to be half-drunk and half-mad. He stumbled across the room toward her with no fear for his life. Then he stopped for a moment and stared at the old couch intensely, on his lips a hint of a painful smile.
Rosa picked up the letter from the desk and handed it over to Storm. “Thomas Astley-Byron is dead,” she said—a statement and a prediction. Then she pulled the necklace out of her pocket and handed it over to him. “I believe this is yours.” He stood there, shattered, looking at the medal in the palm of his shaking hand. Then he unfolded the pages and began reading them frantically.
She dropped the gun on the desk, walked to the pod in the corner of the room, and jumped into it. As the cocoon closed around her, she heard the devastating wail of a man undone. Once again, he expressed what she felt deep inside her soul.