Unplugged (3 page)

A girl with long red hair examined her green sparkly nails, looking just as bored as Rain. It was Lacy Mills, daughter of Bryce Mills, CEO of the pornography App industry, a man simultaneously loathed and lauded. “Let's download something super edgy the second school lets out,” she said.

Rain didn't even look at her. “No.”

The other girls laughed, like he was joking.

Lacy looked up at him. “What do you mean, no?”

“I'm sick of Apps. They're all the same.”

A pretty, dark-haired girl reached out and ran a finger down Rain's cheek. “That's not what you said the other night.”

The other girls laughed again, though Lacy's eyes flashed with jealousy.

“I'm serious,” he said.

The laughter died away.

Rain turned. Stared straight into the paparazzi cam that followed him everywhere. It was supposed to be
invisible, its lens as tiny as the point of a pin, but somehow Rain knew exactly where to look. “In fact, I've made a decision and I want the entire App World to know.”

The girls hung on his every word.

The boys stopped pretending not to listen.

“I've decided to do my Service,” Rain said. “The day I become a seventeen, I'm going to unplug.”

“But you can't do that!” the dark-haired girl cried.

“Why would you unplug?” Lacy's long nails sliced green through the atmosphere. “Service is for
Singles
. For people who can't afford to get out of it. For the
poor
.”

The group of guys came closer. One of them sneered. “Is there something you're not telling us, Holt? A little hollow sound in Daddy's capital account?”

“Service is supposed to be for everyone,” Rain said, unflustered. “For all Under Eighteens who want a taste of the Real World.” He looked straight into that lens again. “And I. Want. My. Taste.”

The clip buzzed and fizzled, then immediately started from the beginning again.

More Singles gathered to watch the replay.

At the time this first broadcast, nobody could believe the son of the Prime Minister had just announced he would unplug. Lacy Mills was right: only the poor return to the Real World, and when we go, it's because we want to see family or because we lack the capital necessary to sponsor our release. Nearly all the Singles in this room
had stories like mine—brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers they hadn't seen since they were three or seven, family that some were too young to even remember. Service affected us the most.

Rain Holt had no such excuse.

Surely he had some hidden agenda with this stunt.

No one ever got an answer that made any sense, though. Jonathan Holt's only comment was that he would miss his son while he was away. I wondered if Rain was punishing his family by making his plan public before they could talk him out of it. He had to know that once the word was out, it would be more scandalous for his father to stop him from unplugging than to allow him to go ahead. If the Prime Minister tried to prevent his son from doing Service because it was dangerous or because it was something only poor Singles did, he would have enraged his more socially conscious supporters.

A flash of anger burned in my middle. “Serves him right,” I said to no one in particular.

A nearby Single, Sateen, turned to me. She had long blond hair like Inara, but she was plainer, less glitzy. “What did you say, Skye?”

The hologram of Rain had just reached the part where Lacy Mills was studying her sparkly nails. “Rain unplugged because he was
bored
,” I said. “Because he's so rich he had nothing better to do than disappear for a while. He's so arrogant. I'm glad he's getting punished.”

Sateen studied me. “You don't mean that. He's still a boy with a family he won't get to see again. He's just like us.”

I shook my head. “Rain Holt is
not
like us.” Sateen's eyebrows went up. “You heard all those men congratulating Jonathan Holt for closing the borders. They want to keep more people like us from coming here. Unplugging for me was never a joke. Service was the only way I could ever see my mother and sister again.”

Sateen put a hand on my arm. “You're upset, Skye. Tonight has been a disappointment and a shock for a lot of us. I understand why you're angry, but don't take it out on someone else's suffering.” She was being so rational and reasonable. So kind.

Her words took some of the sting out of my anger, but not all of it. “Rain Holt isn't capable of suffering. He's always so . . . unaffected.” I crossed my arms. “I can't bring myself to feel sorry for him, okay? If that makes me a bad person, then so be it.”

“You're not a bad person,” Sateen said. “But neither was he.”

I closed my eyes a moment. Tried to block out the holograms flashing and talking everywhere I turned. “I need this day to be over. I'm going to my room to shutdown for the night.”

Sateen gave me a sympathetic smile. “You'll feel better in the morning.”

“Right,” I said, but I doubted this. How could I feel better when my only opportunity to see my family again had just been rescinded? Before Sateen could move away I stopped her. “I'm sorry for your loss, too.”

Her brow furrowed. “My loss?”

“Now you won't get to unplug. You won't see your family either.”

Sateen's face brightened. “Actually, I was dreading Service. I'm so relieved about the Prime Minister's announcement. Can you imagine—an entire
year without Apps and the virtual comforts of home? I was only doing it because of the obligation, and lucky for me, that obligation is gone, and the guilt along with it!”

I took a step back, off-balance. “Oh. I . . . I . . .”

“More Singles feel this way than you might think,” she said when I didn't finish. Then she took off in the other direction.

“I'm bored,” said the hologram Rain for the fourth time, or maybe the fifth. I covered my ears even though it was useless. The sound of Rain's voice reverberated through my head.

I needed to get out of here.

I was about to leave the lounge when another hologram caught my attention and I slowed to watch. I couldn't help it.

Rain was gaming with friends, dressed as an archer, moving through a forest of tall thin trees covered in
a ghostly white bark, his bow and arrow ready. I knew exactly where he was and what was about to befall him. The game was one of my favorites. A lot of people my age preferred Appearance and Personality Apps, but I liked the ones that would allow me to run fast like a gazelle or swim deep and far in the ocean like a fish. I loved a good Surfing App when I felt like having fun, and I had sharp instincts for danger, and for the right way to go in a maze or on unfamiliar terrain.

In the hologram, Rain dodged a snow-white tiger roaring toward him. The animal turned to dust after Rain effortlessly shot it in the back with an arrow. A big part of me longed to see him fail in a game where someone like me excelled. More beasts awaited him, too. They would come quickly now.

A branch snapped. Then another.

Rain turned toward the sound.

Again, he seemed to stare straight into the tiny camera lens.

Straight at all of us, watching him.

Or maybe not all
of us.

My heart quickened.

For the second time that night, I had the uneasy feeling that one of the Holts was looking at me. That of all the millions of voyeurs, Rain Holt was seeing
me
. Logic told me this was as impossible now as it was before, even more so because this hologram was a memory. Rain couldn't
pick me out from the crowd because this wasn't happening live.

Yet as I stood there locked in his gaze, it certainly seemed real.

There came the loud crack of another branch.

Rain turned toward it and the feeling evaporated.

THE NEXT MORNING
a crowd awaited us outside Singles Hall. The throngs began their assault as soon as I walked through the doors into the sunlight.

“Congratulations!” someone shouted at me.

People roared.

Congratulations?

I looked around, searching for a way through the mob. Inara and I usually met down the block. The only open space was in the center of the street, so that's where I headed. Other Singles followed.

Cecily Gomez was right behind me. “This is insane.”

“I don't even know what this is,” I said. As Singles we weren't accustomed to being watched. Singles didn't
attract voyeurs. “They're cheering for us like we're celebrities.”

Jayson Venice caught up to us. “What did we do to deserve this?”

Cecily shrugged. “Stopped sucking down capital now that Service is canceled?”

“Well, whatever it is,” he said, “it's kind of fun.”

I looked at him. “You think this is fun?”

Jayson shrugged. “My surrogate family got in touch with me for the first time in two years, wanting to know if I was excited about the border closing.”

“Mine, too.” Cecily huffed. “I was surprised they remembered my name.” She eyed me. “At least not all of us have that problem.”

“I know I got lucky with the Sachses,” I acknowledged, turning away.

I kept searching the crowd for Inara. That's when I began to read the posters people held high in the air.

You are saved!
flashed across one of them.

Another said,
Our Under Eighteens
are liberated!

No more buyouts!
said yet another.

The crowd was treating the border closing as cause for celebration. An excuse to skip work. A number of citizens had downloaded Apps that turned their hair green or blue so they would stand out. There were men dressed in tuxes and black hats, and more than a few women sparkled with jewels draped across their wrists and necks and had coats
of animal fur pulled across their shoulders, the heads of the creatures dangling down their fronts, eyes still blinking. People held long thin flutes that fizzed and popped with golden liquid. They cheered and clinked glasses.

People chanted as we passed. “We are finally free!
You
are free!”

“No more Service!”

“Down with the unplugged!”

“The body is a house of death!”

“The Race for the Cure must be won!”

A man in a glittering suit reached out to grab my hand. “Congratulations,” he said giddily. “You're among the last of the Under Eighteens to be plugged in!”

I yanked my hand away and kept moving. Of course, he was right. With the borders closed, no one else would be uploaded to the App World. Within two decades, Under Eighteens would be no more when the youngest of us reached the age of majority. The man spoke as though it was a good thing that the population would be capped.

People tossed confetti and streamers.

Did everyone feel this way?

Anger flashed through my brain. Now that Service was canceled, the wealthy would be even wealthier. They wouldn't have to spend any capital to stop their children from having to unplug.

Well, lucky them.

I hurried along, raking my fingers through my hair,
trying to untangle the tiny flecks of colorful paper clinging to it. My eyes burned but I tried to gain back control of my emotions. I would not let these people get to me. I looked around at my fellow Singles, searching the crowd for a sympathetic nod.

What I saw was startling.

Sateen was a little ways ahead. She was smiling, her hand in the air, waving at our audience like some sort of queen.

That's when I began to notice the Apps.

Someone tossed Sateen an icon and she caught it, grinning at the free download in her hand. She squirreled it away in her account, only to look up and find another on its way. Other Singles saw what was happening and followed her lead. Soon the atmosphere was littered with so many icons the sky glittered and flashed. Singles were grabbing at the air, greedy for the kind of App riches we typically only dreamed about. Soon there were boys wrestling on the ground, confetti and streamers piling up on their backs, and girls shrieking at one another over whose icon was whose. I passed Jayson and Cecily shouting about which one of them would keep the Sports Star App dangling above their heads.

The crowd looked at us like we were animals. They threw Apps like they were raw pieces of meat and we were a pack of hungry dogs. We behaved exactly how they imagined, too, clawing our way over one another for
whatever we could get our hands on.

My cheeks flamed. I covered my face with my hands to hide these flickers of shame on my virtual skin. I was part of a group to whom people tossed their scraps. Singles rewarded for the mere fact that we would no longer be allowed to unplug and see our Keeper families, symbolic of the end of an era so many people had obviously resented. Amid the frenzy, more App icons rained down. I gave up trying to shake away the streamers and confetti. Twirls of fluorescent purple and green decorated my hair. When my hands slid from my eyes again, I saw Adam. He stood unmoving across the street, a boy statue on the boulevard.

We watched each other through the chaos.

I nodded at him, a strange calm falling across me.

This time he didn't sneer. He nodded back, only slightly, but enough that I saw him do it. Then his attention caught on something else, his eyes narrowing. I searched the crowd for the object of his gaze, but then someone called my name.

“Skye!” Inara's voice cut through the noise all around. “Over here!”
Skye, look to your left
, she chatted in my mind.

I turned and saw her blond hair shining bright in the sun, lighting her up. She waved frantically, beckoning me from the crowd. I glanced back at Adam but he was gone, lost among the other Singles. Inara disappeared around
the corner and I went after her, pushing through the distracted onlookers. They were like a forest of trees, each one of them growing taller than the person in front of them with the help of an App to better view the chaos. When I turned down the next street, Inara was waiting there, her father's long black car already running.

“Are you okay?” she asked as I approached.

“Yes. No. I don't know.”

She gave me a hug. “This is crazy.”

“Let's go to school. The crowds won't be able to get to us there.” The downloading of Apps and the presence of voyeurs were prohibited inside the building.

Inara looked at me uncertainly. “Are you sure you don't want a day off?” Her eyes sought the ground. “You know, um, to celebrate?”

My mouth opened in surprise. “How could you even ask that?”

Inara shifted from one foot to the other. “I don't want to lie to you, Skye. Like I said last night, this is probably for the best.” She reached for my hand and squeezed it. “Being in the body for a whole year, being trapped in the Real World with the Keepers, it could've . . . it could've
killed
us. The body is fragile and susceptible to disease, and now we don't have to worry about that anymore.” Her eyes were pleading. “I know you wanted to see your mother and your sister, but I'm your sister, too. You're the only one I have. You don't have to worry about being
separated from your surrogate family anymore. Isn't that worth celebrating?”

I busied myself opening the door of the car. “Sure, of course,” I lied, feeling ungrateful as I got inside. Inara joined me in the backseat, but I didn't look at her. Soon we were speeding off to school in silence. Even though I was with my best friend in the entire App World, who thought of herself as my sister, I'd never felt so alone.

Most of my memories of the Real World were hazy or quick, but I remembered the day I plugged in like it was yesterday. My mother and sister brought me to a beautiful old train station in New Port City, the one that wasn't used for trains anymore. At five, I was old enough to understand I was going on an exciting, virtual trip, yet still too young to grasp that it would be years before I'd return.

When it was time to leave, my mother and sister lied to me.

“We'll see you soon, my Skye, my heart, my love, my darling.” My mother covered my face in kisses. I had to wipe the red smear of her lipstick from my skin.

I looked up into her wide blue eyes—eyes just like mine. They were glassy. Her tears frightened me. “When will I be back?” I asked. An exact count of days would help me get through the sadness. In my left hand, a soft blue bunny dangled toward the ground, my favorite toy.
It was nearly the same hue as my T-shirt and pants. Blue was my favorite color.

My sister, Jude, put her arm around me. “Stop worrying, Bean. Soon you'll be having so much virtual fun you'll forget all about us.”

That was when another woman, the Keeper in charge of children plugging in, came through the door marked
Departures
. I don't remember her face, just that she was tall, impossibly tall, it seemed. So much bigger than me. Her pale, loose garments were bright against her skin.

My mother crouched to my level, two matching streams of water running down her cheeks. “Blue like the ocean and blue like the sky, blue like the sapphire color of your eyes,” she sang softly, her voice hoarse. “You'll always be my blue Skye.”

The tall Keeper took my hand. “It's time to go.”

“No, I won't,” I said, my mouth an angry pout.

My sister tried to smile but I could tell she wanted to cry like my mother. “You won't what? You won't go?” she asked.

“No. I won't forget about you,” I said. The woman took me into her arms when I wouldn't budge. I looked back at my family one last time. They were waving, tears pouring down their faces. “I won't,” I called back.

For a long time, I wrote to them. With the help of one of the School Apps, I composed short letters to the Real World, the best I could manage.

Dear Mom, I love you so much! I miss you and Jude, Love your blue Skye.

Dear Jude, I wish you could read me a story. Love, Bean.

Mom and Jude, when are you coming to live here too?
Love Skylar-Bean.

Eventually, the notes I composed grew more worried, more insecure. I didn't bother to sign them—I didn't feel like I needed to.

Did I do something bad to make you send me away?

Mom and Jude, do you not love me anymore?

Have you forgotten me completely?

Each time I finished a new message, Mrs. Sachs would help me post it. At first, back when the letters were sweet, she treated it like a game, checking my spelling and teaching me how to upload communications. Every day I would check my mailbox, and every day I would be disappointed there was nothing from my mother or sister. Months passed. Then years. My insistence that Mrs. Sachs help post my letters wore her down. She became less and less enthusiastic with each new message and her excuses about why I heard nothing back became repetitive and hollow. Then one day, when Inara was busy with homework and I asked yet again for her help, she led me to one of the couches in the living room. The two of us sat down.

“I think you're old enough to know the truth,” she said.

I had just become an eight.

“What truth?” There was a tightness in my voice. After three years of hearing nothing from my family, even a little girl gets suspicious.

“About your family, Skye. Their intentions for your future.”

I nodded. Everything started to fade as she spoke. Emptied of color and light.

“Your mother and sister aren't coming to get you,” Mrs. Sachs said carefully. “They've taken on the important, selfless role of Keeper of Bodies. By doing so, they gave you a better life. But by plugging you in, they gave up all contact. They aren't going to respond to your letters, my dear. They can't. There isn't any point to checking your mailbox for messages. Communication is prohibited. Sending letters to the Real World is only pretend.”

Stars clouded my head and made it hard to speak. “But why?”

Mrs. Sachs took my hand. “Imagine if your family was writing you all the time, telling you about life in the Real World, or worse, how they were suffering. The law prohibiting communication between Singles and their families is there to free you, so you can live your virtual life unburdened by them.” She shifted a little, the bright flash of her earrings a shock in all the dullness. “Not knowing helps alleviate the stress and despair that comes with feeling so divided.”

Even at eight, I knew what Mrs. Sachs meant. It was basic worlds history. Before the first plugs, an early version of the virtual world existed. People carried around handheld devices that allowed them access to it. But the maintenance of two entirely different selves—one real, one virtual—was confusing and exhausting. People became so addicted to looking at their tablets that they stopped going outside and even stopped talking to their real friends and loved ones. The App World saved everyone this division by liberating people from their bodies and allowing them a permanent virtual existence.

But then, what about Singles like me, whose very presence in the App World was the result of dividing a family?

When I didn't respond, Mrs. Sachs sighed. “It's better this way, Skye. It's easier. You'll realize this too, one day.”

I could barely breathe. “So I'll never talk to my mother and sister again?”

Mrs. Sachs looked away. She was silent a long time, staring out the window at the tall buildings in the distance. “No. Well. Unless . . .” She stopped.

“Unless what?”

“All children are supposed to unplug for Service. It's meant as a time to experience the Real World, and for Singles to see their families again.”

“I want to go. I want to go now.” My voice cracked.
“I need to see them.” All the questions I wanted to ask my mother and sister swirled in my brain like a bowl of alphabet soup.
Did you abandon me? Do you still love me? Are your lives better without me? Did you really want to give me a better future or was plugging me in just an excuse to make me go away?