Archive for the ‘Authors’ Category
Connected / Chapter 7: Disconnect
Friday, September 3rd, 2010
AUTHOR’S NOTE: The following is the final chapter of the flash serial, “Connected.” Search for the tag “Connected” to find other chapters.
They find Morello surrounded by the bodies.
“My son,” he says, by way of an excuse. “They put my Caul in a coma.”
One hundred forty-seven dead. All terrorists. Responsible for thirty-six deaths and sixty-two comas. Including Morello’s son. One forty-seven to ninety-eight. Morello takes that as a win.
The Vigilant Vigilante, the pressfeeds dub him. Rogue AI leak parts of his recorded feed. Children relive his moments of rage and revenge. They hack Caul’s feed too. Five hundred bucks for five minutes of coma static. It’s a seller’s market.
They put him on trial. The pressfeeds go wild. They blame themselves, music, society. A society of hate they say.
“No,” Morello says. “I did it for love.”
With Morello, society is on trial. When everyone is connected, when the thoughts of parents, siblings, friends, co-workers, celebrities, presidents, all mutter in the back of your head, who is innocent? Who is guilty?
And Morello sits in his cell. And his son lies in his coma.
The first jury is hung. Perfectly balanced. Mind connects to mind and fails to find black and no white. Just gray.
There is no answer, no simplicity. Only fuel for a media funeral pyre. And eventually that burns out.
Finally the government lawyer comes for him. “We cannot hold you,” he says. “We cannot let you go.” The lawyer’s meatsack wears round polished glasses. He outlines the compromise.
#
Caul’s hospital room is cold and white. Caul’s meatsack is two years older than when it first lay down. Morello lies down next to it. Nurses attach wires and evict his soul.
#
Caul’s mind is cold and white. His body does not move. Morello is the ghost in its machine. “Caul,” he says, “I want to tell you a story. I want to talk to you about love.” And he speaks into the white blankness of his son’s mind, and he tells him of ties stronger than wireless signals, and what it drove him to do.
#
Outside, Morello’s wife sits and watches what passes for justice. She sits alone. Disconnected. And she does not share the moment when her son’s hand twitches.
Aftermarket
Thursday, September 2nd, 2010
By the time the sky began to lighten to gray, Abbie had finished painting a pentagram that encompassed the entire interior of her car. She had painted through the night using clear nail polish, a miniature flashlight gripped between her teeth.
When she crawled out the door and straightened up, finally stretching her cramped back muscles, it felt like someone was prying her apart with a crowbar. Abbie’s eyes watered, but she kept her groan fairly quiet.
Compared to gathering the ingredients for the invocation and painting the pentagram, the actual process of calling the demon was anticlimactic and easy. The object of the summoning was just a weak little Dolor Culi (a name that she was told translated roughly to “pain in the ass”). Abbie reached into the back seat of the car, set the materials on fire on top of an old cookie sheet, stepped away, and recited the Latin she’d memorized.
The car filled with a dull green smoke, which stank like a burning outhouse. In the depths of the roiling cloud, two bulging red eyes peered out balefully, though as the smoke dissipated they went invisible with the rest of the demon, just like the books said.
Abbie and her car stood in the driveway of a small, yellow house that badly needed repainting. Now she walked to the front door and knocked on it. She had to keep knocking for several minutes before Danny’s new girlfriend Britney–the one he’d been cheating with–opened up, squinting and wearing an oversized Pokemon t-shirt. Britney grimaced when she saw Abbie, but pulled the door open and walked toward the back of the house, shouting “Danny! It’s your ex.”
Danny emerged from the bedroom bleary-eyed, wearing only his beloved Soviet Russia boxer shorts. Abbie tossed him the keys. He grabbed for them belatedly, still befuddled by sleep, and missed. The keys hit the carpet with a muffled jangling sound.
“Hope you enjoy my car,” Abbie said.
Danny smiled. “I will enjoy my car,” he said.
“That I paid for.”
He shrugged theatrically. “Title’s in my name. Next time you should be smarter.”
“From your mouth to God’s ear,” Abbie said, and left.
As she walked off toward the bus stop, she waved to the Dolor Culi. She had no way of telling whether or not it waved back.