Peter Liu - Bald New World

“There’s still people inside.”

The factory doors were sealed shut and the fire was preventing people from getting too close.

“Get out of the way,” Larry ordered the people standing about. Then to me, “Get out.”

“You can’t go in there.”

“This is not a discussion. Get out!”

“I’ll come with you.”

He looked at me. “You want to die?”

“Maybe I want to get some footage for our new documentary.”

He turned to me. “What would you do if I gave up the film business?”

“Make seven more films that’ll fail at the box office. I’ll dedicate all of them to you.”

He laughed. “Hold onto your seat.”

He hit the accelerator, but before it hit the building, the car shut down. The AI notified us, “Safety protocols have overridden manual control. Please—”

“Can you go to the back and deactivate the AI?”

“How?” I asked.

“Press the manual-override button on the panel,” Larry said. “I’ll pop the hatch.”

I stepped out, but before I could ask where it was, Larry sped forward, crashing his expensive car through the front doors.

Damn him.

All three stories were burning and the throng outside watched helplessly. Various bystanders were trying to dial the fire department, but phones were offline. It smelled of burning machinery and the stench was hard to bear.

“—was a big bursting sound. I turned around and the whole mechanical arm fell down,” a woman described the scene. “I ran for the door and right when I got out, the whole thing collapsed behind me. There was no warning anything was wrong and none of the machines detected overloads.”

Billows of smoke fumed furiously up. Part of the building crumbled and all the remaining windows on the west side burst. I coughed from the smoke. A few people tried to push me back to a safer distance. I insisted on staying put. My eyes were glued to the door. Where’s Larry?

Visibility was dampening. The fire was intensifying and it resembled a living force, devouring everything in its wake, gorging on itself and swelling with fiery cholesterols. I wanted to rush in, but the blaze was too strong. Segments of the roof caved in and the fractals within the fire bisected, sundered, and expanded. There was a raucous creaking sound. I forced myself to step forward, covered in sweat. My hands were sooty. I loosened my shirt, wiped my forehead. “Larry?!!!” I shouted. “Larry!”

A speaker with a mellifluous voice declared, “Fellow brothers and sisters, please calmly head to the central building. Everything is under control, everything is well. We are suffering technical glitches that will be resolved shortly.” Soothing classical music from the automated emergency record was blaring to the image of decimation in front of me.

The explosions were too coincidental to be an accident. Was it an attack? During the African Wars, scenes like this were so common, I got inured to them as I spliced and edited them to resemble action films. I’d never actually seen burnt people without the digital barrier. In front of me, a man was screaming in pain, rubbing his charred arms that looked like they would crumble. Another woman’s hair was cinders, her mouth starkly vermilion against the blackened skin. I hated the smell of burning. It was consuming my nostrils and Larry was nowhere in sight. A dozen people rushed out the door and were immediately taken to safety by the ambulances that had arrived. A pair of automated hovercopters (a hybrid form of a helicopter and airplane that didn’t have rotors but used engines for more stability) descended with huge buckets of water as they hosed the factory.

“Where’s Larry?” I asked them. “Have you seen Larry?”

“He’s back there trying to save Mr. Foster.”

“Where’s Mr. — ?”

There was a boom, a tempestuous swirl of fire that was formless, burning in irregular spasms. The building was collapsing. Through the door, I could see one of the conveyor belts melt. The smoke intensified and I was coughing to try to exhume the ashes. Someone tried to drag me away but I pushed them off, wanting — needing to stay. “Larry!” I shouted again. I wondered if I should go in but there was another blast and it looked like the building was going to implode. That’s when I saw a white figure through the smoke, forming like someone was molding the shadows into a sculpture. Something was galloping forward with a scintillating bell — a cow, mooing and running. Behind, it was Larry. He was carrying an old man. Several hospital workers were ready with a gurney to take the man to safety. Larry’s face was charred and his white suit was covered in streaks of black. He placed the man on the gurney, looked around and spotted me.

“Are you all right?” I asked and put my arm on his shoulder only to flinch as it was still hot.

Larry petted the cow. “Thanks to this fellow, I am.”

“And the car?”

He waved it off. “I put it to good use.”

“You’re crazy, man. Aren’t you scared of anything?”

“Are you kidding me? I was scared off my ass,” Larry declared. Behind, we heard the fire sirens of a fleet of hover-copters. The full rescue team arrived and carted Larry to safety.

III.

Russ was apoplectic. Five of the factory buildings had been targeted and four of those were beyond repair. The first few hours had been spent putting the fire out. Once that had been done, it was damage assessment in the conference room. While the police continued their investigation outside, Russ targeted his rage at the heads of security. “How could something like this happen?”

“We warned you about the Colonel.”

“Do we even know it’s the Colonel who did this?!”

The guy who couldn’t look me in the eye was ripping into these security chiefs that were twice as big as him. Larry had asked me to sit in while the doctors checked him for burns. What I gathered from all the yelling was that no one had any idea what had happened.

A nurse came in and told me, “Larry asked for you.”

Russ said, “If Larry’s okay, tell him I need to see him immediately.”

I followed her out and was expecting to go to the infirmary, but she led me through the lobby and outside where we crossed the field. It still smelled of ash and the speakers were still playing the soppy classical music of violins and pianos. “Where are we going?” I asked.

“To see Larry.”

Larry was waiting at the southern gate with a new car.

“Are you going somewhere?” I asked, surprised.

He leaned in close. “There’s a traitor and I don’t know who it is.”

“Working for the Colonel?”

He shook his head. “I got the report back. There were no casualties, even though there were a lot of injuries. Whoever did this waited until most of the people cleared out. That’s not the Colonel’s style. She’d want to maximize violence.”

“Who do you think it is?”

Larry stared at me somberly. “We have too many enemies. It could be anyone. I’ve been away too long and neglected my duties. I wanted to be a filmmaker. But when it comes down to it, I’m a wigmaker.”

“There’s nothing stopping you from being both.”

“Except these huge explosions.”

“You’re not hurt?”

“The suit worked perfectly. Thank George for me if you see him. He has a bunch of crazy suits he’s been working on,” Larry said. “All cancelled military projects.”

“I’ve heard. Skeleton projects.”

He seemed amused by what I’d said. “Most wealthy people have skeletons.”

“That’s not just the wealthy.”

Larry took out the capsule from Dr. Asahi. “If it’s someone against us, then we can fight back. But if it’s related to this, then we deserve it.”