Final Empire (24 page)

I went to her bed and brushed aside a mound of twisted sheets, sending potato chips and empty bags to the floor.

She folded her arms.

I glanced at the bed next to me, raising my brow.

After a few more obligatory grumbles she walked over and sat at my side.

“So,” she huffed. “What’s up?”

“What’s up,” I said, “is that you’ve been locked in your room alone, and it’s not healthy.”

“So what?” she fired back, more defensive that I’d anticipated. “You lock yourself away all the time, Mox.”

“I know, and look how fucked up
I
am.” I pointed to my face. “Is this what you want to end up like in ten years?”

Her shoulders sagged, the anger draining from her face. “Yeah, fair point.” She rubbed her forearm, massaging the skin that had been sliced open during the raid on Darmaki’s palace.

“So…Kenneth is living in a pyramid, now. That’s different. I always pictured him as a French Colonial type of guy. I didn’t know Egyptian-chic was his style.”

“How did you know?” I asked.

She rapped her blue-painted fingernail into the face of her wrist com. “McGarrity sent me the footage. He was recording the entire conversation. Kenneth has really changed, huh?”

I nodded. “Yeah, time will do that to people.”

“Except for me,” she said weakly, her eyes trailing along the floor.

“You’re awesome just the way you are,” I assured her. “Change is overrated.”

“But everyone gets to grow, expand. Become a better version of themselves. Look at you, helping innovate ways to feed people and get water to the poorest places on Earth. Peyton is becoming a veterinarian. Gavin re-built his entire business. Even that dick McGarrity has a freaking book deal.
Everyone
is a better version of who they were, and I’m like…”

“A great friend,” I added. “
And
a good person. Plus you’re a very adequate cosplayer, if you don’t mind my saying.”

“I’m an
echo
. I’m like that superhuman clone Jonathan Ma: just a fragile copy of a copy. It’s like I’m living out the same experiences, wearing the same face each and every day, but nothing improves. I’m always just a blurrier, more busted copy of who I was the day before.”

“You can’t believe that, Brynja. You’re so much more than
this
.” I waved my hand up and down her body. “This is just a shell, it’s not
you.
Just like this,” I poked my fingertip into the side of my forehead. “This isn’t
me.
My condition – this shit I’m going through – it doesn’t define
who
I am.”

Her eyes widened. “Oh, Mox…I didn’t mean to compare. What you’re going through is
so
much more serious.”

“What I’m going through is called
life
,” I smiled. “And sometimes it sucks worse than we can possibly imagine. And sometimes it feels like a game of Whack-a-Mole: one shitty problem pops up, you gather the strength to slam it down, and another even shittier one pops up right next to it. You just keep whacking away over and over again, until you can’t whack any—” I paused, realizing I was miming the motion of holding a handle, moving it up and down in a ‘whacking’ motion, dangerously close to the zipper of my jeans.

She giggled like a young girl, covering her mouth. “You might wanna work on your metaphors a little, but yeah, I hear what you’re saying.”

Brynja’s smile faded and she leaned in, resting her head on my shoulder. “How do you do it?” She whispered.

“Do what?” I asked.

“Stay so freaking
positive
?”

My memory continued to fade with each passing day, but that was the first time I could recall
anyone
accuse me of being ‘positive’ about anything. I was historically the one prepared to throw in the towel at the first sign of adversity.

I let out a short laugh. “Are we talking about the same person, here?”

“The Matthew Moxon from Arena Mode would’ve never come here
just
to cheer me up – especially not with an inoperable tumor eating away at his brain.” She held up her thumb and index finger, barely an inch apart. “How many times were you
this close
to quitting during the tournament?”

“I guess…”

“And it took a life or death situation to shake you out of your apathy,” she said, pivoting towards me, hugging a knee to her chest. “A bullet flying at your head, your friends being threatened…now, you’re back in the same spot you were back then – worse, actually – and you’re not only strong enough to keep moving forward, you’re trying to pick
me
up, and drag my sorry ass along with you.”

I suddenly had visions of following in Steve McGarrity’s footsteps, writing my own autobiography – but with a more inspirational twist.

“I’ve learned a lot about myself since Arena Mode,” I said. “And I realized the only thing that sucks more than life is living it alone.” I put my hand on top of hers, lacing our fingers together. “We both have a shit-load of moles that we need to whack the hell out of…if you’re feeling up to it, maybe we can whack them together?”

“Sounds like a plan.” She said with a weak smile. “So, now that I’m all cheered up, is there anything else you wanted to talk about?”

“The video that McGarrity sent you: did you see the part where Kenneth claimed he was tracking me to the Liwa Desert?”

“Sure,” she shrugged.

“He lied.”

“Okay…so say you’re right about this,”

“I am,” I assured her.

“So that means he knew we were there some other way.” She paused, bringing a fingertip to her lips. “Satellite imaging?”

“I don’t think so. Fortress 18 is cloaked; he’d have no idea when we were coming or going. Plus I don’t see ‘The Living Eye’ as someone who relies on technology all that much. Not his style.”

“An insider? A mole?” she glared at my suspiciously. “Wait…what about your pilot? The one Peyton hired.”

“Karin? Doubtful. I’ve had my eye on her since the moment she came on board at the Moxon Corporation.”

“But how can you be sure?” Brynja asked.

“I also monitor all her transmissions. She hasn’t called anyone outside of her on-again/off-again boyfriend, her mom, and the pizza delivery place in Manhattan that uses drones to drop the box on your doorstep.”

“Damn,” she said, rubbing her stomach, “I could use some Drone and Drop right now…”

“
Focus
,” I said with a laugh.

“Right, sorry. So are you going to make me guess all night or are you going to stop being an asshole and share this mind-blowing theory of yours?”

“All right,” I said, “My problem is that I thought this was all about me.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Surprise, surprise.”

“But it’s not. It’s about
you
.”

“Me?” She asked, her eyes snapping open.

“Kenneth didn’t come to save me from being attacked by Sultan Darmaki – he came because he knew
you
were there. And he didn’t know until McGarrity accidentally sliced your arm.”

“So wait, you’re saying that when I bleed this glowing blue ectoplasm that it actually sent out a signal? It’s like a GPS that tells Kenneth where I am?” She looked down at her arm, sneering, as if a troupe of angry insects were crawling through her veins.

“Occam’s razor.”

She lifted her eyes. “Is that Klingon?”

“No,” I laughed. “It means the simplest explanation is usually the correct one.”

“My magical blood is the
simplest
answer? I think you and I have very different definitions of that word, Mox.”

“It was the only anomaly during that entire fight,” I explained. “No one contacted Kenneth and tipped him off, and there were no sensors, cameras, or any other way to know we were there. When he came he was expecting
you
to be in trouble – he didn’t take off like a blue lightning bolt until he saw
me
there.”

“Whoa.” She brought her hands to her forehead, dazed after the bombshell I’d just dropped. “So...what does that mean?”

“It means that you’re connected to him – tethered, somehow. I don’t know
exactly
how but I’m going to find out, Brynja, I promise.”

She let her arms fall at her side and her eyes cleared. It was as if she’d felt a blissful release – like a crushing weight had been lifted from her, allowing her to breathe again. “Let it go,” she said plainly.

“What?”

“Let. It. Go,” she repeated.

I didn’t understand. “But this is what you
wanted
, Brynja. To figure out why you can’t change your appearance, why you can’t phase through things anymore, and now, with the blood—?”

“I can’t spend the rest of my life wondering
what
I am…I need to start becoming
who
I am. Look around here, Mox – this is insane!” she threw her hands up, waving around at nothing in particular. “I’m here with you
again,
in one of your hermetically sealed domes, hiding from reality. The reason I left in the first place was so I could venture out into the real world and find my place in it.”

“So you want to leave?” I asked.

She fell back onto her mattress, staring up at the ceiling as I’d just done in my own room. “I don’t know what I want,” she said, her voice thin and exhausted.

“Welcome to the club,” I said with a sigh. I fell back, landing at her side.

“But I
know what I
don’t
want,” she added. “I don’t want to be a burden to you anymore. And I don’t want to spend any more time focusing on Kenneth. He’s moved on as well, and if he wants privacy then he deserves it. Whatever I am,
who
ever I am, I’ll figure out on my own. It’s just scary.”

“Scary?”

“Scary because…” she trailed off, biting down on her lip. “What if I
never
figure it out?”

“That’s probably another one of those ‘being human’ things. We’re never complete. But we keep trying to finish a puzzle that never runs out of pieces, and then get frustrated if we don’t see a clear picture.”

“Humans are weird,” she grumbled.

“We definitely are.”

We continued to stare up at the ceiling, side by side. It was a blank canvas, untouched, and like the rest of the room it was in desperate need of some color. With a next-gen 3D printer and an entire staff at my disposal, I could have easily redecorated the room…I could’ve re-done
all
of the rooms throughout the entire fortress if I’d wanted. But day after day had drifted by, and I’d grown accustomed to the blandness. I’d convinced myself that it no longer bothered me, and that the effort of changing the design wouldn’t be worth the hassle. Anytime I’d mustered enough energy to take some initiative, I’d let something else distract me – something that I pretended required my immediate, undivided attention.

I couldn’t help but think she was right: searching for answers you’ll never receive is no way to exist. The only way to push past the apathy is to focus on what really matters and chase your passions. And there’s never a better time than the present.

Brynja finally rolled over, propping herself up on her elbow. “Wanna get some pizza?”

I bolted upright, smiling wide. “I thought you’d never ask.”

I’d gathered with Brynja and a few of the staff in one of the common rooms
, happy to have a snack before my cooking show marathon with Peyton. Watching those shows are torturous enough – they’re positively agonizing to consume with an empty stomach.

The circular white room had a sunken sitting area, where couches and lounge chairs surrounded a new floating holo-screen – a state-of-the-art projection that was like a massive eight-sided die that rotated slowly on an invisible axis. You could watch a simulcast while viewing from any angle. Much to the delight of the employees, I’d finally enabled outside communication, which meant Frost’s reign of tyranny had finally come to an end (only sixteen short months after his death).