The Body Electric - Special Edition (11 page)

I gasp. “That—!” I glance up at the holographic projection of Dad standing mutely beside Jack. But before I can finish the sentence—
That watch belonged to Dad!
—Jack throws it on the ground and stomps on it with all his weight. The watch crunches, and the hologram of Dad disappears.

“Why would you do that?!” I scream, dropping to my knees and picking up the bent and broken watch face. “That was my
father’s
!” This was an antique, passed down for generations from father to son in my family. Dad gave to it to me a year or so before he died, after Mom seemed cured and he was promoted to work directly in Triumph Towers, researching bots and androids for the government. The engraving on the inside of the watch is still there, exactly as I knew it.
P.K.D.S.
The initials of my great-something grandfather.

Jack swoops down and picks up a cracked silver-colored bead from the shattered remains of the watch. “Well, Dr. Philip didn’t put a tracker in it, that’s for damn sure!” He holds the tiny object out to me, glowering.

“How did you even get this watch?” I ask quietly, staring down at the broken pieces.

Jack stands abruptly, knocking the watch face out of my hand and dropping the metallic bead into my palm. “A tracker. You put a
tracker
on me.”

“I didn’t do this,” I say in an even monotone. I’m barely able to control my rage. I have so few things that are my father’s, just his, and seeing the broken watch is like seeing a memory of him smashed against the dirty stone floor. “How did you get my father’s watch?”

“Because
you
gave it to me!” Jack roars. I flinch, and he takes a step back, breathing deeply. His eyes search mine, full of scorching rage. “Are they coming?” he asks.

“Wh-who?” I stutter.

“The M.P.s. The cops. Did you lead them here with your stupid little tracker program?” He steps around me, flinging open the door and looking out into the bright sunlight.

“I didn’t call anyone,” I say. My voice is stronger with each word. “No one followed me. And I didn’t do that. I didn’t put a tracker in the watch. And I didn’t give it to you.”

“What are you even doing here then?” Jack says. His voice is low now, and it sounds almost disappointed. Defeated. “I know you hate me, Ella, but why are torturing me?”

“Torturing? Hate you?” I gape at him. “I don’t even
know
you!”

Jack’s face falls into an emotionless mask. “I’m beginning to think that might be true.”

“Of
course
it’s true!” I shout. “I never even saw you before yesterday! So I couldn’t have put a tracker on you—and I’m still waiting to hear how you stole my father’s watch!”

The color drains from Jack’s face. He just stares at me, speechless.

“What?” I demand.

“You remember Akilah, though, right?”

My hand goes instinctively to my necklace, the fortune cookie locket with a digi file of Akilah and me inside. She has a matching one.

Jack runs his fingers through his hair. “I’ve heard that the government uses subliminal messaging to control people,” he mutters. He casts an appraising eye on me. “But this is so specific…”

“How do you know Akilah?” I demand again. I don’t care what kind of mind games he’s playing at; I want answers.

Jack doesn’t speak for a moment. He looks as if he’s carefully choosing his words. “Akilah and I were in the same unit.”

“She’s never mentioned you.”

“She probably didn’t think you wanted to hear about me.”

I rake my eyes over him. “Obviously not.”

“No—I mean—” Jack growls in frustration.

“Let’s just clear this up right now,” I snap. I raise my wrist, my fingers skimming across the surface of my cuff.

“What are you doing?” Jack demands.

“Calling Akilah. If she knows you, she can tell me.”

“No—don’t!” he tries to knock my hand away.

I narrow my eyes. My fingers stay on my cuff—not on Akilah’s contact info, but on the police’s.

Jack’s lips curl up, but it’s not a smile. It’s a grimace. There’s a look in his eyes that is far sadder than I’ve ever seen before. My stomach drops, and dread rises up within me. A warning flashes through my head, and I’m suddenly reminded of the day my dad came into my bedroom to tell me that Mom had Hebb’s Disease.

“Akilah’s dead,” Jack says, and it’s not just the words that kill me, but the tone, full of sympathy and sorrow.

nineteen

The air leaves my body in one whoosh, and I stagger back away from Jack as if he’d hit me. But then I shake my head, clearing the confusing thoughts.

“I
just
talked to her, less than an hour ago,” I say.

“You really didn’t,” Jack says in a terrible low monotone.

I scrutinize his face, but even though he’s wearing an emotionless mask now, there is truth in his eyes, grief. His shoulders are slouched in defeat. He’s got the build of a soldier boy—athletically large, quick reflexes, a certain set of his jaw that indicates he’s seen more than he should.

But no matter how much he appears to believe what he’s saying, he’s obviously lying. Or crazy. Or both.

I glance down at his arm, and notice the way he tugs the sleeve of his jacket over his wrist. I remember that he’s missing his cuff.

“You’re off the grid,” I say. “You’re on the run. You… you deserted the military didn’t you?” This fully supports my theory that he’s tied in with the terrorist rebels Representative Belles is getting mixed up with, and I grope behind me for the doorknob, feeling the cool metal solid beneath my fingers, ready to run if I need to.

A muscle moves behind Jack’s jaw. “Around a half a year after I joined,” he says. “After Akilah…”

I wave my hand, dismissing this. Akilah’s not dead.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Jack growls.

“Like what?”

“Like I’m a deserter.”

“Akilah’s not dead,” I state, and saying the words makes me feel stronger. “You are a deserter, and—” I stop talking. I don’t know what I was going to say next.
And I’m leaving?
No—I can’t. I don’t know how I got the tracker program on my cuff, but regardless, the tracker’s destroyed now. If I leave, I’ll never be able to find Jack again. This may be my only chance to capture him for PA Young.

My hand closes on my wrist, my finger millimeters away from the panic button that will bring the police.

“Wait,” Jack says. It’s the way his voice cracks over the word, desperate, that makes me look up at him. “God, I hate this,” he mutters, running his fingers through his shorn hair. His clear, pale eyes—not quite blue or gray, but something in between—look up and meet mine.

“Just—here.” Jack holds out the thing he retrieved from the other room earlier, waiting for me to take it. My hand shakes as I reach for it. A small, folded up piece of paper that’s slick and heavier than normal paper. A digi strip. “Just watch this, then I think you’ll understand.”

“What is this?” I ask, opening the strip up. The screen is dark, waiting my command.

“Answers.”

Exactly the thing I came here to find.

“I’ll wait, here.” He points to the other room. “Just—watch it. And then if you still don’t believe me, I’ll…” He lets the promise hang in the air between us, unspoken.

I unfold the digi strip slowly as he turns to the other room to give me privacy.

“And—” Jack says, pausing at the door.

I turn, but he doesn’t speak for a long time. He just looks into my eyes, as if trying to see through me.

“And?” I prompt, impatient.

“And,” Jack says, his voice low now, “I’m sorry.”

I flatten the unfolded digi strip in my hand, swiping my fingers across the surface to turn it on. A date written in black letters illuminates the screen. December 26, 2341. Last year, just after Winter Festa. There’s a small timestamp on the bottom, certification that this digi file was recorded on this date.

“Jack, what are you doing?”

My heart freezes at the sound of Akilah’s voice. She sounds happy, playful. She sounds exactly the way I remember her.

“Recording.” Jack’s gruff voice.

The image bleeds onto the paper: Akilah, wearing her military uniform. She looks so professional—wild hair tamed into a beautiful twist, the crisp lines of her pants visible even on the digi file, her brown eyes big and smiling. A single star glitters on the right side of her chest—she’d only been in the military for a short time, and already had risen up one rank.

“Yeah, but why are you recording?” Akilah looks impatient, but she smiles playfully at him.

The image sweeps away from Akilah, toward a building. They’re clearly both at the Lunar Base in Serenitatis—there are military grade rovers scattered on the roads, the shimmering dome in the background. But Jack’s focusing the camera on one building in particular. It looks almost like a hospital or dormitory, but as Jack zooms in, I can see that the windows aren’t glass but painted bricks and the doors are locked with heavy iron bars across them.

“Don’t you ever wonder what’s over there?” Jack says in a low voice.

“None of my business.” Akilah sounds serious now, too. Maybe even a little scared.

The camera moves, as if Jack’s turning to talk to Aks. “The people ordered to go into the Laboratory Facilities… they’re not coming out the same way they were.”

Akilah rolls her eyes. “Not everything is a conspiracy theory, Jack.”

“What’s going on over there?” A deep female voice shouts out, followed by a series of thuds as she approaches.

“Nothing, sir,” Akilah says immediately, jumping to a salute.

Jack doesn’t speak. His camera is facing the ground, hidden by his hand. “Sir, nothing sir, we were just wondering, sir.”

“Wondering about what?”

“The Lab Facilities.”

The woman pauses. “Soldier, it would be an honor—an
honor
—to be selected for duty at the Laboratory Facilities. It is a privilege, and only the top officers are allowed entry.”

“Sir, yes sir,” Jack mumbles.

There’s more words I can’t distinguish, but soon the commanding officer strides away. Jack seems to have forgotten about the camera, but the audio is still recording.

“Akilah, look—the people who go in that building come out different,” he says in a rushed voice. “And they’re targeting people from the Foqra District.”

Akilah sucks in a harsh breath. The Foqra District—the poor section of New Venice—is where she lived before she was assigned to military duty for her year of service.

“The people who go in… they come out not caring about anyone or anything. What’s the most important thing in the world to you?”

The camera tilts—Jack’s remembered he’s holding it again. It fills with Akilah’s face as she touches the fortune cookie locket around her neck. I do the same, fingering the familiar smooth silver. This is the sign of our friendship, the thing that ties us together even when we’re so far apart.

Akilah’s father disappeared on them when we started secondary school. Her mom was financially ruined, and she and Akilah had to move to the Foqra District. When Akilah got her military assignment, her mother decided to move to Tunisia to look for work, and I know that Akilah doesn’t hear from her often.

Neither Aks nor I have a sibling, and fate and tragedy has isolated us. But the one thing we always had was each other.

Akilah doesn’t answer Jack’s question, but she doesn’t need to.

The screen fades to black, and a new date pops up: January 8, 2342. This year, a few weeks after Jack’s first vid.

The image on the screen makes me feel motion sick—it’s bouncing around as if the person holding the camera is running. The entire screen turns white for a moment, then a loud
boom
echoes from the digi file. A bomb. My eyes search the screen, trying to pick out Akilah in the mass of people screaming and shouting, running away from—or, in the case of the military, toward—the bomb.

The person holding the camera curses—I think it’s Jack again, but I’m not sure—and a small cloud of gray dust obscures the screen.

The voice behind the camera starts again—just one word over and over: “
Nonononononono
.” And then the camera drops. I see Jack fall to his knees, gray dust smearing his clothing. And something wet. Something red.

Blood.

Not his.

An arm. The forearm shorn to the bone, white standing out starkly against dark flesh.

Jack crouches over the body of a girl, slender and tall, with wild hair done up in twists. His shoulders start to shake. I see him stiffen then, and lean back.

And I see her face.

Akilah’s dead, staring eyes.

Water splashes onto the digi file screen. I smear my tears away.

Jack pushes on Akilah’s chest, up-down, up-down, but it’s too late. Her stomach is ripped apart, her guts spilling onto the dusty ground, turning the grayish earth dark. One leg is twisted up under her body, the other is completely gone.

I sob, choking for air. My eyes burn so much that I cannot see the rest of the film strip.

Jack wasn’t lying. This isn’t a lie. There is nothing truer than her death and the way my soul is silently crying out in sorrow.