Complete Atopia Chronicles

Hal really shouldn’t be quite so trusting, no matter what the possible gains. He was lucky he was dealing with me and not someone else.

“She loves you, you know,” he added, watching me, fishing for something. I grew impatient. Before I could say anything, he beat me to the punch.

“Sorry Jimmy, I don’t mean to test you—old habits die hard,” he laughed. “I very much appreciate this. Consider me at your disposal for anything.”

“Are you coming to the Infinixx launch tonight?” I asked.

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” he replied sarcastically, obviously no fan of the Killiam clan.

I let it go. “Good, I really want everyone to be there.”

He nodded, returning his attention to the tomato plant.

“Anything you say, Jimmy.”

I nodded goodbye and clicked out of that sensory space. I was really looking forward to the launch.

14

Identity: Patricia Killiam

“TEN!… NINE!… EIGHT!…”

I looked out at the packed crowd in the Ballroom, feeling the excitement build, and in the background my splinter network scanned the nearly billion people who had tuned in to witness the launch of Infinixx.

“Aunt Pattie,” said Nancy, turning to look towards me with tears in her eyes, “I’ve decided that I’d like it to be you who throws the switch. All this, everything here is all because of you!”

The crowd continued to roar the countdown, “…six…”

It was her moment to shine, not mine.

“I’d love to sweetheart,” I replied quickly. My physical self was back helping Vince on another goose chase in the grow farms. Even if I’d wanted to, there was no way for me to throw this switch without my body here. “I had a last minute thing come up. You go ahead dear!”

My stomach balled into a knot, realizing something had gone horribly wrong before I even understood what it was. I flipped my pssi into identity mode to reveal a completely empty room. Not a soul was here physically, not even Nancy. I immediately realized the disaster that was about to unfold.

“…five…”

“Okay Jimmy, how about you then?” asked Nancy, still unaware. “Go ahead. I really wanted it to be one of you two.”

She released the switch and encouraged Jimmy to take it.

I tried to unlock the exterior security perimeter to bring a psombie guard into the room, but Nancy and Jimmy had the security keyed into them. I desperately pinged Jimmy for access.

At the same time I had Marie querying the proxxi of all the senior executives up on the stage with us. All of them had last minute plans for not coming physically, including me. They had all hidden their excuses because we’d asked them to come in person, thinking it wouldn’t make a difference. It was exactly what I had thought as well.

“…three…two…”

“I’m really sorry Nance,” replied Jimmy urgently. “I had something too. You go ahead…quick now!”

Jimmy’s face registered his surprise as my access control request hit his networks and he also understood the position we were in.

“…ONE!”

Nancy turned as white as a ghost when she realized what was happening. Her words of seconds ago now echoed in my mind, “All this, everything here is because of you.” An audible ‘snap’ rang out in the air as the Chinese and Indians flipped their own switches at their remote locations.

What was going on? Vince had asked me to come and help him, and to keep it a secret, but his futile pursuits were something I had set him on myself. I hadn’t planned this, and in fact I would have done almost anything to have stopped it from happening.

Already the world press had figured out what was going on. A Times article trumpeting “Infinixx—Everywhere but Nowhere!” was being filtered in to the main Ballroom display.

Lawyers from the Indian and Chinese sides had instantly filed lawsuits against Cognix claiming monumental damages. By now Jimmy had unlocked the exterior security perimeter, and I could see a psombie guard racing towards the stage.

“Forget it,” I heard echo in a distant splinter. It was Nancy speaking, her primary subjective still standing alone on the stage, completely destroyed.

§

Was I a woman who dreamt of being a butterfly, or a butterfly who dreamt she was a woman? The butterfly in me now yearned to escape, and it was getting hard to mask the tiredness.

Immunosuppressant nanobots in my bloodstream had been attacking my own red blood cells after the latest round of genetic modification therapy, so I was now anemic, or something like this, my doctors were telling me.  Running away from one tiger, and leaping towards another.

In another splinter, right at the same time as the Infinixx launch was unfolding, I’d been holding a different press conference. The disaster had already sparked a destructive media tsunami, and I could see the smiles start spreading across the reporters’ faces while their incoming messages pinged and they looked up at me on the stage.

“In short,” I listened to myself saying to the reporters, “for things to remain the way they are, things must change.”