“W … Where am I?” Mission asked me after she had her fill of air.
She scrambled backward, panting, and unable to focus on any one thing. The wrinkling sound of the space blanket underneath her made her flinch. Then she slapped her hands against the ceiling and the walls, searching for a way out.
Seeing her face so nearby trapped a response on the tip of my tongue. The Ignis’ cameras were supposedly life-quality, but her eyes were somehow greener than I even imagined. Her skin more flawless.
I reached out to stroke her impossibly soft cheek, but she slapped me away. She flipped over, threw off the blanket, and scurried down the ladder into the station. I tried to follow but couldn’t grip the rungs properly with my injured hand and arm. Instead, I slid all the way down.
“Gloria, stop her!” I yelled.
Despite reeling us back in, her proxy was nowhere to be found. Mission darted back and forth through the hall in a panic, her welt-covered body bare. The space blanket fluttered down over my head. I grabbed it and hurried after her.
“Mission, calm down!” I coughed and slipped back to my knees. An entire half of my body felt like it was on fire. I had to crawl.
Mission reached the station’s exercise space and shrieked the moment she saw the stripped-down humanoid bot positioned inside. She ran from it as if she’d seen a monster, toward Lance’s former living area. I drew myself to my feet and staggered toward her along the wall, falling a few times. By the time I reached her, she’d already stopped. She was on her knees facing the holographic mask replicating Jacen’s face.
“Wh-what is this?” she stammered.
I finally caught her and wrapped the blanket around her back. After being in space, she must have been freezing. She completely ignored me.
She steadied one hand with the other and reached out to touch Jacen’s face. Light diffracted around her skinny fingers. Her eyes bulged. She grabbed the band it projected up from and spun in, swiping her hands through over and over. “What is this!” she yelled. She flung it and scrambled away.
“It’s not real.” I took her by the shoulders. “Mission, you’re safe now.”
She smacked my hand away. “How do you know my name? Where the hell am I?” She stared right through me, unable to tear her terrified gaze away from the device as Jacen’s expressionless face rolled across the floor. “Where…”
“I’ll explain everything. I promise.”
She squeezed around me, drawn suddenly to the holoscreens. Gloria’s proxy had left them on, and Ignis: Live played. Enforcers were cleaning up the airlock hollow after the ceremony.
“That’s… Ignis . How?” She whirled around and froze again from what she saw through the viewport. As the asteroid the station clung to rotated, blue Earth became visible amongst the sea of blackness and stars. A crescent of sunlight bloomed along its rounded edge.
“What is…?” She fell, clutching her chest as it heaved.
“Mission, just breathe,” I begged.
I’d played how our first interaction might go countless times in my head since I’d decided to save her, and it was never like this. I cursed my tendency to fantasize. I thought back to being released from my synth-womb for the first time back in High Earth. I understood there was a world and everything about it, but it was all disconnected. Like pieces of a puzzle spread haphazardly across a table, which my VORA helped me piece together. The difference was, I had been where I supposed to be. To her knowledge, she was light-years away from any star. Yet there, right before her, was a planet and a sun.
I didn’t know how to begin to explain.
Mission bent over and threw up bile. I took a cue from Virgil, kneeling behind her and rubbing her back. “It’s okay,” I whispered. “It’s all going to be okay. Let it out…”
I lost my train of thought as I saw a ship flit across the viewport. It moved too rapidly for me to see any markings, but there was no question in my mind whom it belonged to.
“No,” I said to myself. “No, no, no, they can’t be here that fast. That’s impossible.” We hadn’t been on the station for more than an hour after the Network had been warned about an intrusion.
I wrapped my arm around Mission and tried to lift her, but my body was too battered to support her full weight.
“Mission, you need to hide,” I groaned. “Mission.” She was in no condition to understand what I was saying. She continued to stare blankly at Earth as if her brain had been switched off like a circuit board. I scurried about the room, half on one knee.
“Gloria, where are you!” I yelled. “Come help me.”
An alarm wailed. VORA’s systems buzzed to life. “All station occupants, prepare for imminent arrival of Ignis: Live developer Craig Helix,” she announced. “Please clear the docking area.”
“Gloria!” My foot kicked Lance’s handmade chisel. It slid across the floor and banged into the wall filled with the tally marks he’d carved over the years. A new inscription ran across them. Words that could only have been carved by her proxy. REMEMBER THE STARS.
My breath fled my body. Gloria was gone. She’d lied and was here on Ignis for something else, while I was about to be caught with Mission because of it. After everything we’d gone through.
“No!” I told myself. I wasn’t going to be hindered by doubt and self-loathing again. I’d endured enough of that when I was cast out into the Outskirts, and now I was far across space with an inhabitant of Ignis —a star of the show to which I’d dedicated my life—beside me. A young woman whom I cared for deeply, who needed me now more than ever.
I limped over to Mission and grabbed her. My side burned with bright lines of pain as I lifted and hauled her across the room. The cabinet the station’s med-bot had hovered out of before the proxy zapped it remained open. It was big enough to fit her. We tilted from side to side as I walked, and every time I had to plant my left foot to gain balance, it felt like I’d been shot.
I shoved her inside the tube just before crumpling. The pain was unbearable, but I rolled over and couldn’t help but marvel at her. Even in her state of shock, she was more beautiful than anything I’d ever seen.
“You have to stay in here, Mission,” I said. “I’ll figure out a way to sneak you onto that ship. You’re going to be fine.”
All I wanted was for her to make eye contact with me, to trust that I could help, but it didn’t happen. So I draped the space blanket over her head, hoping it would disrupt scanners as well as it did radiation. Then I grabbed the cabinet’s cover and pulled. It was jammed. Positioning my feet against the wall, I pushed as hard as possible, screaming until it slammed shut. Losing my grip threw me backward, and I slid across the polished floor. By the time I came to a stop, a unit of High Earth public safety bots flooded the kitchen.
“Intruder, do not move,” they ordered. “You have been deemed a threat.”
I couldn’t convince my body to move any more even if I wanted to. They surrounded me on every side, their weaponized arms aimed. Then I heard someone clapping.
Two of the bots parted, and in strode Craig Helix himself. His resident-issue tunic was programmed to purple, every bit of it pressed and clean. Only there was no OptiVisor covering his face this time. He regarded me with blithe fascination.
“Well done, Asher,” he said. He clapped a few more times as he joined the circle. “I couldn’t have scripted this better myself.”
“Mr. Helix,” I groaned, “what are you doing here?”
“There I was, on my way to introduce a new fixer to this station, when surveillance informs me that Asher Reinhart crashed a waste vessel right into it.” Another clap. “Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.”
“I had to get out of the Outskirts,” I lied, improvising. “You don’t know what it’s like.”
He ignored me, smirking as if he was in on a joke while he walked over to Lance’s charred body and tapped it with his foot. That was when I noticed the fixer’s pulse-pistol and cursed myself for not taking it.
“A shame,” he said. “I guess I have to thank you for solving that particular problem. It would have been impossible to support ending his probation after his failure.”
“You’re welcome, sir.” I was trying to stall, to think of how I was going to get Mission out of the cabinet and into Mr. Helix’s ship without anyone noticing. “You can’t even imagine how good it is to see you again.”
He strolled all the way back to me before responding. “Where is he, Asher?”
“Who?”
“I saw the footage of two people entering here. Feeds showed that one bore the brand of an Unplugged behind his visor. Now tell me where he is. There’s no need to lie anymore.”
“I don’t know.”
He kneeled so we were on the same level. “Asher, you don’t have to be scared,” he said. “I’m not upset with you this time. In fact, I wish I had been smart enough to record you after your exile. I could’ve never even imagined you’d go this far when I left your memory intact. Throwing in with the Unplugged just so you could be close to the Ignis again. What you did has haunted me for many nights as I took back control of my show. I even considered having the memory wiped so I wouldn’t have to keep asking myself how you could be capable of such deceit. But perhaps I underestimated your dedication.”
“That’s all I wanted you to see.”
“Then you must know that dangerous men like an Unplugged can’t be allowed near the show. They live to see the pleasures of High Earth shut down so we can all wallow in despair with them. So please, Asher, tell me the truth. Seeing you go through all of this for the show has made me think I might have acted rashly in reporting you without really hearing your side.”
I took a deep breath. Was he offering me a chance to get back to High Earth? I wasn’t the expert trader Virgil had become, but an answer in exchange for returning home seemed fair. Unfortunately, whether I wanted to go back or not, Gloria’s proxy had disappeared without a trace.
“I swear, I don’t know where he went,” I said.
His calm façade vanished. “Take him.”
Two security bots seized me by the arms and started to drag me.
“I don’t know, Mr. Helix! Let me go!” I kicked and screamed, but it was no use. I thought I could appeal to his better nature, but maybe Virgil and Gloria Fors were right about him and it didn’t exist. We crossed the exercise room. Adjacent to the entrance to the airlock was a sealed door I hadn’t noticed earlier.
“VORA, please open the infuser entrance,” Mr. Helix commanded.
“Right away, Mr. Helix,” she replied, powered back up again. The door opened to reveal a small circular room. The only thing in it was a top-of-the-line brain infuser and its control terminal. The bots shoved me into the chair and locked me into the restraints.
“Leave us,” Mr. Helix ordered. They marched out and the door shut behind them, leaving us alone again. He had more privileges with the Network, thanks to his standing, than I’d ever even imagined.
“If you’re going to once again withhold the truth, then I’m going to find it myself,” Mr. Helix said. “It seems the Outskirts hasn’t taught you anything, Asher. And this, here, this is my world, where the Network bends to me. My program.” He took his position at the infuser’s control terminal.
“I swear I don’t know where the Unplugged went!” I protested. “He won’t hurt the show, Craig. He was honoring a trade, getting me here. Just let me stay. I’ll be the new fixer, do whatever you need.”
“I’m sorry, Asher,” Mr. Helix said. “It is as I feared. You are beyond repair, and I can’t take any more risks. It’s time to see everything you’re hiding.”
The neural nodes surrounding my head sparked to life. A glowing blue transmitter band descended over my temples. Mr. Helix wasn’t anywhere near as gentle as Minah had been. In an instant, my ability to do anything but scream was rendered useless. My head felt like it was being split open, brain leafed through like the pages of an ancient book. Everything that had happened since Mr. Helix cast me out flooded my consciousness…
* * *
When the infuser finally powered down and my head slumped forward, it felt like it’d only been seconds. Of course, it hadn’t. Mr. Helix stood in front of me, newly shaved and manicured. He had his arm around Mission’s shoulder. She was cleaned up as well, wearing a resident’s tunic that fit snugly to her lithe body. Her naturally messy hair was straightened and shiny, the red in it highlighted, and her pale skin washed of Ignis’ grime.
The only thing the same as when I'd last seen her was that she wouldn’t focus her eyes on me. Thanks to a heavy dose of pharma clearly administered by the lifeband now around her wrist, her eyelids could barely open. She looked detached. Is that how I used to look?
“Mission…” I moaned. I couldn’t stand to see her gifted mind neutered like that.
“You have quite a collection of new friends, Asher,” Mr. Helix remarked. “You may have been telling the truth about that Unplugged, but the location of their nest, as well as Gloria Fors being alive? Befriend a man who actually did try to murder you in your own smart-dwelling? It’s hard to believe you wouldn’t report all of it. I know, after all of this, to still be surprised by your recklessness. You truly are broken. The High Earth Network will put an end to Gloria’s dangerous, unsanctioned operation straight away.”
“Please… don’t hurt her…” I reached for Mission, but a bot impeded me.
“Why would I do that? Misguided as your intentions were, your knack for capturing raw human emotion is undeniable. Our fans will be thrilled to see her. Not on a screen. Not in a VR. I’ll walk her along the skywalks themselves, and people will leave their homes and raise their visors just to look upon her face. To touch her. Then they’ll know how real the Ignis is.” He regarded me warmly. “I don’t know why I didn’t think of this sooner, Asher. Engaging viewers directly in person. Answering their questions and visiting with them. Mission is going to be a star for the rest of her now-lengthy life, and it’s all thanks to you.”
I rocked my body forward so hard the bots had to restrain me. Pain swelled everywhere. “Mission, don’t listen to him!” I yelled. “I know none of this makes any sense to you, but when you get the chance, you have to run as fast as you can!”
Mr. Helix rolled his eyes. “You’re unbelievable, Asher. I find out that you came all this way to save her, and now I promise you she’ll live comfortably forever, and still you’re not pleased. I’m sorry it has to be this way, I truly am, but you’re too unpredictable now to leave with your memory.”
I ignored him and focused on her. “You taught me what it means to live, Mission,” I said. “Don’t let him take that from you.”
“It was wrong of me to erase you from the show’s credits like you had no impact,” Mr. Helix said. “I let disappointment cloud my judgment. You’re only human, after all. I’ll tell High Earth that you retired, like the chief director before you, but that you had one last flicker of brilliance to leave behind for the viewers.” Mr. Helix sighed, as if he actually felt remorseful. He patted me on the chest. “Don’t worry, Asher. I’m going to send you someplace you loved more than anywhere else in the universe. You won’t have to worry about her anymore.”
The infuser hummed back to life and threw my mind into a frenzy. The world grew blurry, but I fixated on Mission. “You’ve been my life from the moment I was born,” I said. “You opened my eyes, Mission.”
My consciousness started receding the moment I got her name out. For a heartbeat, she was there, looking directly at me. And beneath all her drug-addled confusion, I could tell she was listening. Finally, after so long, she heard me.
That was my last memory…