Robin Wasserman - Shattered

From Zo.

Her av was draped in black, as always, its oversize dark eyes lined in blood red. It spoke in her voice.

I know what happened, Zo’s voice said, her av staring straight out of the screen, straight at me, the way she never did, not since the accident. We need to talk.

If three people had broken into the Temple in the dead of night, with intent to vandalize a sacred space and plunder its sacred secrets, perhaps Savona would have been obligated to turn them over to the secops. But the trespassers were mechs—three of them, as it was announced in every vid, on every news zone, no mention of the one released or the one who chose to stay. And the secops wanted nothing to do with them. Savona was on his own. So were the mechs—they were his mechs now.

When it came to rights, we were in a liminal zone. No one’s property, not yet—but not quite our own, not anymore. Ani had chosen her team wisely: three mechs whose parents had given up on them, who had no remaining ties to the org world. No one to care if they disappeared. BioMax refused to get involved, given the “criminal nature” of the circumstances under which they’d been acquired.

Not taken, not kidnapped. Acquired.

Call-me-Ben wasn’t taking my calls.

And the network was wild with support for the Brotherhood of Man, horror at the narrowly averted attack. Three mechs surely headed toward a ventilation shaft or somewhere worse. Three mechs with deadly intent, headed off in the nick of time.

Three mechs, strapped to three tall, sturdy posts, made from freshly cut pine. Posts drilled into the stage at the front of the Temple’s largest auditorium. Directly behind the central podium. The perfect visual backdrop to the next Brotherhood rally.

Three mechs, their hands bound, their heads shaved, their mouths gagged, their eyes open.

Confirmation that the electric shock hadn’t completely shattered their systems. But who knew whether the shock had incapacitated them, fried the connections between the neural network and the body, leaving them trapped inside their own heads, plastoid lumps for the Brotherhood to pin up like ornaments. Or whether they’d been left broken inside, half there, half absent, damaged remnants of their old selves, gibbering wild-eyed nonsense, missing reason, missing themselves. What would it look like, madness in a mech?

“Here is our enemy,” Savona said, his back to his audience, to the cameras, preaching to his prisoners. “Crept into the very heart of our Temple, just as the skinners have wormed their way into the heart of society. Here is our enemy, the barbarians at our gates, just as the skinners will struggle to defeat our measures, the boundaries we draw for our own protection. Here is our enemy, and here they will stay, for them and for you. For your benefit, so you can look upon them and truly see. For their benefit, so they can understand their crime, their trespass. Not breaking into the Temple—the Temple is an open door to any in need. Any .” He paused there and I waited for the camera to pan across to her, as it often did—her blue-black hair peeking over the crowd—Savona’s prize mech, his pet mech, the one who’d seen the light. I should have been grateful that he so loved parading her across the vids—it was the only proof I had that my story was true, that I hadn’t led the others to the slaughter, struck my own deal with Savona and Auden to guarantee my escape. After all, I was the one that walked away, free and clear.

I should have been grateful, but I couldn’t stand to see her there, glowing under Savona’s warm approval. I couldn’t stand her expression, coldly serene, empty of doubt or regret. Empty.

But this time the camera didn’t move. It stayed on Savona, leaving the fourth mech, his mech, just another invisible face in the crowd. And I was relieved.

“They would trespass here ,” Savona boomed. “Here, where they’re not wanted, as they don’t belong, trespass without a thought, because their very existence is a trespass upon humanity.”

He bowed his head and raised his arms out to his sides as if flourishing invisible wings. “We bear them no ill will. But we will hold them here, like this, until BioMax agrees to stop creating new skinners, until the government recognizes that those already built must not be allowed to maintain their stolen identities, living among us, carrying the names and faces of the dead. They will be a symbol, a reminder that our fight continues. And when we have achieved our goal, we will release them.” He raised his head then, staring up at the mechs dangling from their posts, unable to respond, unable to look away. “We will release you,” he said, like it was a solemn vow.

Then, for the first time, he faced his audience. “They may never understand,” he assured them. “They are machines, prisoners to their programming. We can’t let their confusion sway us. We can’t let their delusions fool us. We can’t rest until the skinners are forced to accept what you all know in your hearts. Men make machines. Objects . Complicated, remarkable, sometimes wondrous objects. But objects nonetheless. Only God can make a life.”

“You were supposed to be her best friend,” Quinn told me when she heard. “And you want to blame me ? Where were you when all this was happening? Where were you ?”

I hadn’t blamed her. Not out loud, at least.

Just told her what had happened, just the facts. Just what Ani had said and done.

Just that Ani had decided betrayal was what mechs did, so why shouldn’t she join the party.

“What makes you think I was her best friend?”

“She told me,” Quinn said.

She told me you actually cared about her, I thought. She was wrong about a lot.

But I didn’t say that. Didn’t ask how we could be best friends when I barely knew her. Or how anyone would want to be my best friend after seeing what had happened to the last one.

“You were supposed to look out for her,” Quinn said, angry as Quinn ever got.

And I didn’t say anything to that either. Because buried beneath all the reasons that she was wrong—I wasn’t Ani’s best friend, I wasn’t the one who’d broken my promises or broken her heart, I wasn’t under any obligations—she was also right. As right as Quinn ever got, at least.

I’d let her think she was my friend, I’d let her tell me things, secrets, let her listen to mine, asked about her like I cared, had cared, and maybe I’d let myself think we were friends too—and then I’d shut my eyes and looked away.

My fault, not my fault, all of our faults, no one’s fault. And then I linked into the network, saw those mechs, none of them friends, each of them one of us, and all I saw in that moment was that Ani was to blame for what Ani had done.

“Why’d you even do it?” I asked Quinn. “Just couldn’t stay away from Jude, even though you knew it was the one thing that would—” I shook my head. “That’s it, right? Nothing so sweet as forbidden fruit and all that?”

“What am I, a child?” Quinn snapped. “Or Jude’s some god of love I couldn’t resist? Please.”

“What’s the point, then? You just wanted to hurt her?”

“Maybe I don’t need a reason for what I do,” Quinn said. “I do what I want. Maybe that’s the point.”

I didn’t answer.

“You’ll never understand what it was like for me,” Quinn said. “Before the download.”

I wondered—was that what Jude heard when I talked, After everything I’ve lost, I deserve whatever I can get ? Was that why he always threw them in my face, words like “spoiled” and “naive” and “childish”?