Alida picked the ants out of the last cup of oats, mixed the oats with water and heated them over the chemical stove. The sun was rising and all around people were coughing and murmuring and beating the dust out of their blankets. Graycie stretched and rolled over, her gaze on the pot.
‘Show me your leg.’ Alida stirred the porridge and looked over as Graycie poked her leg out of the blanket.
A graze on her knee had become infected, despite Alida’s efforts to keep it clean with water and the juice of some shrivelled-up lemons she’d found on a tree in the burbs. Graycie bent her red, puffy knee and the crust split and oozed pus.
‘Hell. That’s nasty, Gray.’ Alida felt Graycie’s forehead. No temperature. Yet. ‘The implants are only two days away. Do you think you can hang on till then?’
‘It hurts. I can’t run or play. Mum always said we had to take our medicine good and early.’
‘Aw, hell.’ Alida added a pinch of Mum’s stash of cinnamon to the porridge. If she took the risk of waiting any longer she could regret it, the way Mum had regretted not seeking earlier treatment for her melanomas. Graycie’s infections had been known to ramp up from mild to scary overnight. Two days might be too long.
‘Okay. We’ll go today.’ Alida handed Graycie a bowl and a spoon. ‘Eat up your grub first.’
♦ ♦ ♦
Alida waved to Shuqba as she passed the Nutri-Shake queue and went straight over to the dispensary. Shuqba raised her eyebrows over her massive brow ridge. Her Neandertal face still fascinated Alida: she was like a fantastic creature from a story come to life. Alida pointed to Graycie’s knee and winced.
Graycie popped the skirt of Alida’s SunSuit over her head and stretched the fabric tight over her face while they shuffled forward in the queue. Alida remembered doing the same thing when she was little. Beneath Mum’s SunSuit had seemed like the safest place in the world.
The guy in front of them held a swaddled baby in his arms. He swayed and bounced the way you did to quiet a baby’s cries. But the baby wasn’t making a sound. Alida looked away. She’d always been the curious, friendly type. Mum had said she could start a conversation with a rock. For once she didn’t want to know.
They reached the front of the queue and the guy with the baby stepped out of the dispensary, tears streaming down his cheeks. Alida looked down until he passed.
The word DISINFECTING flashed on the metal dispensary door for about ten seconds before it slid open again.
‘You may now enter,’ the android officer said.
Alida pulled Graycie out from beneath her SunSuit and dragged her by the hand into the small metal room.
‘Please scan the affected individual’s wrist chip,’ the dispensary AI said.
Graycie waved her wrist in front of the wall screen.
‘Thank you. Please describe the medical complaint in ten words or less.’
‘Infected wound.’ Alida stifled a sneeze brought on by the nostril-scouring disinfectant fumes.
Graycie traced a finger over the words on the wall panel listing LeaderCorp Dispensary terms and conditions.
‘Please use one of the supplied swabs and place a sample from the infected area onto the white rectangular analysis panel. If you are unsure, please press the smiling face icon for an instructional hologram.’
Alida and Graycie didn’t need an instructional hologram. They had been through this heaps of times, although in the past Mum had always been with them. Alida swabbed Graycie’s knee and wiped it on the screen. The word Processing scrolled across for less than ten seconds before Completed replaced it. A thin film of sanitising nanite gel doused the screen.
‘A suitable antibiotic preparation has been identified. The cost will be ninety-five credits for a complete course of one tablet per day for seven days. If you wish to proceed, press the large green Yes icon on the screen. If you do not wish to proceed, press the large red No icon.’
Alida moaned. Ninety-five credits. That would leave her almost skint with only seven credits. Barely enough to buy one or two pieces of fruit. Graycie must’ve sensed her hesitation. She leapt forward and slapped the Yes icon.
‘Thank you. By authorising a credit transfer, you are accepting the terms and conditions of LeaderCorp Dispensary and acknowledging that LeaderCorp Dispensary is not responsible for any adverse effects or failure of recovery from your condition experienced as a result of using our products as instructed or otherwise. Please hold your wrist chip to the screen to enable credit transfer.’
Alida held up her wrist, sighing.
The AI nabbed her dosh, and just like that she had shit-all again. Credits weren’t even real. You couldn’t hold them in your hand. They were just a number that appeared on an LED screen embedded in your wrist. But they meant everything. The size of that number determined whether you could have a slick life or a nasty one. Sometimes that number was the difference between life and death.
‘Printing now. Your medicine will be available from the dispensing chute in thirty seconds.’
Graycie stood under the chute like she was waiting for sweets. The foil blister pack of tablets clattered out and Graycie clutched them to her chest.
‘Here, let me hold them.’ Alida grabbed the tablets and put them beneath her SunSuit, in the pocket of her jeans. ‘You might lose them.’
The door of the dispensary slid open.
‘Thank you for trusting your health to LeaderCorp Dispensary. Please exit now.’
‘I have to chat to Shuqba for a bit.’ Alida stepped over to the front of the Nutri-Shake queue. Graycie joined some littlies kicking around a real football.
‘Hey, you can’t cut in,’ a guy called out to Alida.
‘I’m a LeaderCorp employee, mate,’ she replied.
‘Bulldust.’
‘I can confirm this lady has been employed by LeaderCorp for duties at this hub.’ Shuqba continued scanning wrists. ‘And cutting in line is not a tolerated practice while I’m on duty.’
‘She looks like another Demi-rat to me,’ the guy grumbled. ‘Why does she get special treatment?’
Alida and Shuqba ignored him.
‘So, do you have another gig for me?’ Alida hooked her fingers into the chain-link fence.
Shuqba smiled. ‘Actually, I do. When the implant fittings commence, we’re going to need someone to field enquiries and address any issues or concerns. The medics think the Demis will feel more comfortable consulting with one of their own. Would you be interested in that?’
‘That sounds slick.’ One of the many knots in Alida’s guts released. She wanted to hug Shuqba, but that wouldn’t look too professional. One of the androids might think she was attacking and electropacify her.
‘I’ll consult with my commander and set it up.’
Alida smiled. ‘I appreciate it. I’m nearly out of dosh. I spent nearly all I had left on antibiotics for Graycie.’
‘Will you need to –’ Shuqba lowered her voice – ‘work in the city?’
Alida winced. She hated being reminded of her gigs for Freel. Especially by Shuqba. She wasn’t ashamed. Being ashamed would mean she was ashamed of everything Mum had done for them. She just felt icky thinking about it.
‘I can maybe put it off for a stretch. Do you think there’ll be any more gigs after the implant rollout’s finished?’
‘Perhaps for a little while … nothing steady.’ Shuqba moved to the side as a broad-shouldered oldie barrelled through the gate, narrowly missing her.
‘Jerk,’ Alida mumbled. ‘Still getting hassled for being a Neo?’
‘Only a little. Most people have got used to seeing me here.’
An old lady at the front of the line patted Shuqba on the arm. ‘You’re dandy, love. You’re just like us.’
Shuqba smiled and scanned the lady’s wrist. ‘There’s something else that could help you,’ she said to Alida.
‘What’s that?’ Alida was open to any suggestions. She’d spent so much time chewing over every possible source of dosh, though, she doubted Shuqba would have any new angles.
Shuqba lowered her voice. ‘There are people, Citizens, who can’t have children of their own. They’d give a child like Graycie a good home. I’m not sure if it’s the kind of thing you’d consider.’
Alida had heard whispers of that sort of thing. But it was always messed-up families in sorrier situations than theirs. Characters in the tent city or the communal shipping containers, those unable to feed their own littlies. That had never been Alida and Graycie. Not when Mum was alive anyway.
‘She’s my sister. She’s all I have.’
Shuqba nodded. ‘My apologies. I shouldn’t have mentioned it.’
‘Don’t feel bad. I appreciate you telling me.’
Raised voices came from beyond the end of the Nutri-Shake line. Not the usual crowded chatter of conversations. This was a large number of voices all working together, repeating the same words and rising above all the others.
‘What the hell?’
Graycie limped away from her game and grabbed Alida’s legs. Odeene was leading a crowd of about a hundred characters. Some of them wore SunSuits. Others in raggedy threads had the sunravaged skin of Rewilders. As they got closer their chant became clearer: LeaderCorp lies, LeaderCorp spies, LeaderCorp implants are LeaderCorp eyes. The chanters stopped in front of the hub. The people in the Nutri-Shake queue moved back as far as they could, yelling a mixture of abuse and encouragement at the mob.
Bloody Odeene again. The stupid vulture didn’t know when she was beaten.
‘What’s their issue?’ Shuqba said. ‘I thought Demis wanted implants. Isn’t that why I got faeces thrown at me and trucks were blown up?’
‘Yep, but that woman in front sees herself as some kind of healer. It’s all a scam, what she does. If everyone gets implants, that would mean even less people will shell out for her bullshit. The rest of them are maybe anti-tekker jerks and a few of them are Rewilders.’
One of the hub androids rolled out and stopped a metre from Odeene. ‘Please disperse.’
‘What are you gonna do, you metal demon?’ Odeene leaned in, her nose nearly touching the android’s face plate.
‘You will receive one more warning. If you choose to ignore this warning I am authorised to deploy a sonic weapon to disperse any illegal gathering within one hundred metres of this LeaderCorp Hub.’
‘LeaderCorp and its evil servants don’t tell us what’s illegal out here. We don’t need LeaderCorp’s laws.’ Odeene held her arms out to the Demis in the queue. ‘See? LeaderCorp is already controlling you all. Once they start carving into your brain, they’ll own you.’
‘I am now issuing your second warning. Please disperse immediately or a sonic weapon will be deployed in thirty seconds.’
Odeene scoffed and waved her dimwits forward along the road. ‘Keep moving. There are plenty more poor deluded folk who need to hear our message.’
The chanters resumed their march and the android rolled back to its spot at the hub.
‘Never a dull moment out here.’ Shuqba huffed. ‘Would you like to collect your rations?’
‘That’d be slick.’
‘LeaderCorp employees are entitled to special cutting-in privileges,’ Shuqba whispered.
Alida nudged her with her elbow. ‘Cheers.’