Clearing my throat, I aim to ask the obvious follow-up with complete confidence—I did what?—But when it comes out all that surety is diluted with shock.
“Come again?”
Doyen straightens from his pose over the simple metallic desk, opting instead to sit in the thin chair behind it. “I have made this deal before, with you.”
Understanding washes over me and I shake my head. “Not with me.”
Doyen corrects himself. “A copy of you, then.”
That sense in my gut—the one that makes me want to drop-kick a fool and then bolt—has grown into full-blown alarm bells. It makes total sense, now: this meeting, the lack of introduction, the faces of his guards.
“I take it the arrangement didn’t work out… for him.”
“He was a traitor. He suffered the fate of all traitors.” Doyen swipes a thumb across his throat in a cutting gesture. “His deception was particularly painful for me. That is why his image was immortalized in the faces of my peacekeeping soldiers. To remind me that trust is earned.”
Amora, the android assigned to care for Rocky, appears in front of the desk where Doyen is seated. She waits for him to look at her. When he does, she bows low and speaks. “I’ve done all I can.”
“Will the boy recover?”
“I calculate a 99.3 percent certainty the child will make a complete physical recovery and a 71.5 percent chance of increase to his full mental faculties, if his therapy is on-going.”
“Thank you, Amora. From now on, this child—”
“Rocky,” I remind him.
Doyen doesn’t acknowledge my interruption, except to address the patient by name. “The boy, Rocky, will be your only patient. You are his personal healer, so keep him on monitor in case he needs you.”
The droid straightens and shows herself out of the long room, by way of a corner on the opposite end.
My mind is racing, picking through the facts and trying to sort out what they mean. Another version of my father was here. And Doyen killed him for welching on a deal.
Now here I stand, wondering if I’m supposed to be impressed that he’s assigned Amora to care for the kid that would’ve been vaporized if I hadn’t found him.
I’m talking to this virtual stranger that doesn’t know anything about me, not even my name, and he’s got me under threat of violence if I don’t take a valuable food source away from a group of dead people and then leave, without taking the defenseless kid I’ve virtually laid at his feet.
How is it that I’m constantly falling ass-backwards into trouble without even trying? See the kid. Help the kid. That is the logical—the human—thing to do. Right? Now I’m supposed to leave the kid at the mercy of a man who’s said he has no problem killing me—who’s already killed a version of my father. Leave the kid with the man who regularly kills children because their biology doesn’t meet some arbitrary standard. Like killing unworthy masses is as common as Tuesday morning.
I understand why Rocky should stay, and objecting to Doyen’s demands when I’m in his world, on his turf where he makes all the rules would be stupid. Besides, Eli asked me to remain as uninvolved as possible. Yet, he was happy about my saving Carrie. She was just a defenseless kid. Like Rocky.
What am I supposed to do? If I say the wrong thing, make the wrong choice, I end up dead, too.
No one would ever know what happened. I just wouldn’t come home.
Eli would wait a year before delivering my letter to Abi and that would be that.
I notice Doyen watching me and make the only choice that makes sense. “With all due respect, I assurance that Rocky will live a long and happy life.”
Doyen sighs, leaning back in his chair. Surprisingly, the stick-type furniture doesn’t break under his plump form. “You cannot trust me to keep my word, so you ask for evidence that I am trustworthy.” He presses a finger over his lips and thinks.
“Tomorrow, Traveler, you have the full day to explore Neutopia. One day with all my services at your disposal. You will see what I do for these people and why. If you are as enlightened as you think you are, then you will understand. Doing as I command will be much easier for you.”
The illusion of choice is better than no choice at all, I guess. I accept his term for the time being and am dismissed by Doyen without another word.
Literally, he just walks out of the room like he was the only one in it, leaving me and Rocky alone in the pinnacle of this tower overlooking a sleeping city. I follow after him but find no doorway or portal, just a blank space in a wall.
Freaking Biolock.
I rub my open hand along the entire surface of the empty space, hoping a keypad will pop out, but nothing does.
After some searching, I find a wall of small cupboards. Inside is a single gray robe and two bags of clear liquid, labeled ‘hydration.’
Breaking the seal on one of them proves that its water—which I guzzle down quickly and then save the second for Rocky, just in case.
As I sit beside the small boy, I find that the bench-like bed is softer than it looks and the surface is warm to touch. It isn’t long before my eyes are drooping and though I want to keep watch, I crash and burn.