Paul Hardy - The Last Man on Earth Club

“Yes. Do you remember?”

“I remember…” she blinked. “Children. In a hospital. Suffocating.”

“Suffocating?”

“Emergency atmospheric purge. No air for the children. They fell…”

“Katie? Are you all right?”

“My function is. Impaired.”

“We can help you.”

“I… do not require… help…”

She stood there for a moment. Then collapsed again, this time back into the chair. I called the medics in and we took her to the infirmary.

After a thorough scan of her brain, we got a neuro specialist on the line from Hub Metro who pronounced the obvious: another seizure, another flip of personality, further neural degradation, one step closer to death. “You should get her to agree to the procedure as soon as possible,’ he said.

“She won’t give us her consent.”

“Which one?”

“Katie.”

“And the other?”

“There’s an ethical issue there.”

He sighed. He didn’t have a high opinion of ethical issues. “How long does she have?” I asked.

“Weeks. Maybe two months at the outside.”

She came back to herself an hour later, the longest period of recovery yet. It was Elsbet who opened her eyes in her old room in the infirmary, tubed up to machines regulating her biological systems until we were sure it was safe.

I sat by her bed to explain about the implants in her brain, that mimicked the ones she expected to be there but which had entirely different functions, accelerating her neural efficiency and wearing her brain down.

She was slower than before, but still had a touch of fire in her. “Take them out.”

“We can’t. We don’t know how to do it without killing you.”

“What’s going to happen?”

“If things stay as they are… you’ll die.”

She closed her eyes for a moment. “Then I’ll die.”

“There is a treatment. We can put you in a new body. It’s easier than fixing the old one. But we have a problem.”

She opened her eyes. “What problem?”

“An ethical issue.”

“A what? ”

“You see… when we found you, in space… you were someone else.” She stared back at me. “You were called Katie. You were a very different person. And when we asked her if she would accept the treatment, she refused.” I sighed. “The problem is… she has rights. And she’s in your skull as much as you are. And to make things worse… we don’t know which of you is the primary personality. You, I mean you , Elsbet… you may well be a persona coming out of the implants. If that’s the case, we have to put Katie’s wishes first. I’m sorry.”

“I don’t believe it.”

“I understand that. But I assure you, it’s true. When you had your seizure, she came back for a moment. And if she comes back again, we’ll do everything we can to convince her to accept the treatment.”

“Who the fuck is this ‘Katie’?”

“We think… well, we’re not sure, but she might be an infiltrator. From the machines.”

Her eyes went wide. “No.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I’m human! ”

I couldn’t answer that. Instead, I asked her: “What’s the last thing you remember? Are you sure it was just the missile hitting atmosphere?”

“Yes! I’m…” But her certainty melted. “No… No… No!”

“What is it?”

“No, no, no, no, no!” She ripped tubes from her arm and noticed she was doing it with the reattached cyborg limb. “Get it off me! Get it off!” She reached to pull it away, but she was weaker and couldn’t grasp it properly.

“Elsbet—”

“Get me out of here! Get me out of this thing! Get me OUT!”

She was screaming and weeping, and there was nothing to do but call in the medics and have her sedated.

I kept the lights off in my office for a while. I had an entirely irrational feeling that everything was suddenly going wrong with the group. Veofol reported that Kwame had withdrawn into his room and switched on privacy for more than the allotted time, and then shouted at him when he went to see how he was. Pew’s injuries were hardly severe, but the nurse who treated him reported a higher than usual fear of human contact, and he only accepted medical care with a great deal of persuasion. Veofol tried to have a chat with Iokan about his past, but ran into the same brick wall I’d seen in his session. And there was still the problem with Bell, which left me feeling irritable and annoyed. I debated the merits of letting Veofol take the next individual session before I became too irritable, but dismissed the idea quickly. Not so much because he couldn’t cope with it, but because I didn’t want to run away from my responsibilities, though it didn’t help that the next session was with Olivia, who would doubtless do her best to avoid it until I personally went in search of her.

So I was very surprised when she turned up on time and took a seat in one of the comfortable chairs, despite her earlier assertion. She was even smiling. But I soon found the smile was far from friendly.

“So,” said Olivia. “What shall we talk about, then?”

“You’ve got something you want to discuss? Of course, go ahead.”

She grinned. “You’ve got man troubles.”

“I’m sorry?”

“You do shout a lot on the phone, don’t you?”

My eyes must have gone wide for a moment, because her smile broadened. I thought I’d taken every precaution when I took the call from Bell in the garden — how had she heard me? Later, I found out: the watering can she’d been fiddling with was the key. She’d unscrewed the sprinkler from the spout, then the spout itself from the can, and found the broad, open spout made an passable ear trumpet.

“I… think that’s private, Olivia.”

“Privacy? In here? Hah! You must be joking! The word’s out, missy, and there’s nothing you can do about it. How does that make you feel?”

“Like a therapist with a patient who’s determined to make trouble.”

“No, no, no. A soon to be single therapist with a patient that’s determined to make trouble.”

“Was there anything else you wanted to tell me?”

“Well! I wanted to know what it felt like to have your husband run off…”

“I’m not married.”

“Boyfriend, then.”

“He hasn’t run off. We had a disagreement.”

“Sounded like a very loud disagreement…”

“It happens, Olivia. I’m sure you have your own experiences in this area.” I couldn’t help being irritated. Too irritated for a therapy session.

“Ohhh yes, but it’s lovely to see you having them as well.”

“Is that what it takes to impress you, Olivia?” I realised I’d snapped back at her and given her precisely what she wanted: anger. Emotion. Stooping down to her level of vindictiveness.

“Who said anything about being impressed? I just think it’s funny.” I took a breath as she smirked. I had half a mind to cancel the session. Or get Veofol in. Or something.

“Well…” I said.

But could I use it? Was there a way into her own trauma?

Yes.

“Well what?” she demanded.

“Perhaps you can help me.” That made her laugh. “You did agree with me when I suggested you had your own experience of this…”

“What, haven’t you got any friends you can go to?”

“No one who’s been through what you’ve been through.”

“You want advice from me? All right. Kill him. If he’s dead he’s not going to give you any problems. There, that’s my advice.”

“I see… is that what you did?”

She held her tongue for a moment. She wasn’t amused any more. I’d found something. “Yes.”