Orpheus | Installment Twenty – Saving

“Sing, Orpheus and the city lives. Grows
green and liquid.
The forest learns an architecture of fancy and of praise.”

– “Three Orpheus Songs”, by Gerald Fitzgerald, 1956

Saving

“Are you afraid?”
“Yes.”
“Energy never stops, remember. It just changes forms.”
“I am still afraid.”
― Amie Kaufman, Illuminae

Sydney didn’t think of herself as evil. Imperfect, fallible, yes, but not necessarily nefarious. Not even at that very moment.

However, she knew that her reaction – a bit extreme, she had to admit, but Lisa Marie really couldn’t stay quiet, could she? – was the result of an ancient wound that had nothing to do with the clones. Or anybody else, for that matter. In all fairness, Sydney was not capable of consciously recognizing the nature of her anguish, the source of her internal pain, and maybe it was because of that, that she had acted out in ways that might seem incomprehensible.

She had needed Lisa Marie – not Lisa the clone, but Lisa the person – to stop talking. To stop reflecting an image that Sydney wasn’t ready to face.

As she watched Lisa slide to the floor like a ragdoll, Sydney felt sad, relieved and misunderstood. All at once. Nobody knew what really was in her heart. Not even those very creatures she had given birth to. Her creations. Lisa and Mike would never be able to understand how much she loved them both, how even her apparently cruel actions were about nothing but love.

Sydney had never believed in simple dichotomies. She thought that pure evil and pure goodness did not exist. She had always challenged herself and throughout her entire life she had tried hard to never be too good or too bad. To her, virtue was in the middle of the spectrum. And now, the failure of everything she thought she was lay in front of her eyes on a polished white floor.

For the first time in her life, Sydney’s idea of herself wavered.

She angrily removed the earpiece from her head and threw it on the floor. Tears obfuscated her vision. She couldn’t even remember the last time she had cried, but it was happening now. Why? Why was she suddenly feeling so emotional? So weak? So disgustingly… human?

“No… No… No no no no no! No!”

The increasingly louder sound of Michael’s desperate voice startled her and she physically recoiled as another set of tears slid down her face. He glanced at Maddix, standing next to her and finding him pale and shocked, utterly clueless about the dramatic turn of events. Then her gaze turned to Michael once again.

Sydney’s hands were shaking and she closed them in fists once again, trying hard to regain control over herself. She hastily wiped away her tears with the back of her hand. Her vision still blurred, she watched Mike as he moved almost in slow motion, and yet quickly enough to grab Lisa before she could fully collapse to the floor, as her lifeless body gave in and stopped moving. He accompanied her down gently, falling onto his knees. Like a repenting sinner.

Sydney swallowed.

“Look at what she made me do! Look at what all of you made me do! You were shiny and brand new! You were sheer perfection! Everything was perfect!” She was yelling now. “You should have thanked me for giving you both the second chance you never had!”

“The chance you just snatched away from them…” His voice trembling, Akira spoke through clenched teeth and knelt down next to Michael and Lisa, checking her pulse. Nothing.

“This is all your fault… Not mine! You did this, not me! You did it to yourselves, you-”

He glared up at Sydney with barely contained hatred.

“Shut up, for Christ’s sake!” He barked, “Just… shut your damn mouth!”

As if suddenly aware of her presence, Mike too looked up at her for one brief moment, his eyes widened and glassy. Disoriented. He was shell-shocked.

“What have you done? What the fuck did you do?! You killed her!”

Then he sat back on his heels and took Lisa into his arms, whispering something incoherent that Sydney couldn’t hear or comprehend. He rested her torso over his thighs and held her, rocking her, one hand gently framing her cheek.

“Lisa… Lise… No, baby, no… No, baby girl, no… Please wake up! Wake up…” He bowed his head, gritting his teeth as if undergoing an intense physical pain, his eyes squeezed shut. His eyelashes sparkled. “Breathe, baby! Lisa, please! No, Lisa, no!”

“Put her down… Mike, put her down on the floor… Let her go… Let’s do CPR… I can do it… I know how to…” Akira’s breathing was erratic and short. He sounded as if he was running. He looked up at Sydney again. “And if you try to stop us, I’m gonna break your fucking neck with my own bare hands, I swear…”

“I can’t feel no pulse… her heart stopped…” Michael’s words sounded frantic and chopped. “…She’s not breathing… she’s not…”

“I know, I know… Put her down on the floor… Wait, scoot over a bit… Let me try…”

“No, you’re too strong… you’d crush her… She’s so tiny… I’m doing it… I ain’t leaving her…” He bent over Lisa and stared at her open, lifeless eyes for a moment. “Baby, please,” he begged, then flinched, his eyes finally welling up.

“Mike…” Akira was doing his best to stay calm and clear-minded. It had never been so difficult. He wiped his sweaty forehead with his forearm.

Michael glanced up at him, breathless and panicking, then started cardiopulmonary resuscitation. In his mind, the old training from his previous life resurfaced. Fragmented words were echoing in his memory. Instructions.

Unresponsive. Not breathing. No pulse.

Thirty compressions. Then two breaths. And then again, and again, and again. Whoever else was in the lab at that very moment simply ceased to exist. Their voices became an unintelligible buzz in the background. The only thing Mike could think about was that he would have never imagined touching her lips that way. Lips that were losing their color, and their warmth.

And then it hit him, with the weight of a ton of bricks. That was how Lisa must have felt back then, when it had been his turn to die on her.

He remembered a picture he had seen down at Level 0, at the black market. In the photograph, Lisa was standing before his coffin. He remembered the look on her face, the unspeakable pain and defeat painted all over her beautiful features, and how she just stood there, as if she didn’t ever want to leave him and yet no longer knew what to do with herself. And all of a sudden, the idea of living – surviving – in a world devoid of her was jarring and terrifying and so very, very sad. He blinked, frowning, and tears fell on Lisa’s shirt, staining it. A blacker black on black fabric.

He kept performing CPR, counting breathlessly, as Akira kept his big hand on Lisa’s head and glanced up at Sydney and Maddix.

“You guys are out of your fucking mind!” He yelled. “Look at what you did! Did she deserve this? To fucking die? Stop this shit! I know you can! Fuck it to all hell!”

“She’s not… Akira…” Utterly devoid of any interest and consideration for what was happening around him, Mike swallowed and blinked, then bent over Lisa’s body again, his ear close to her parted lips. “She’s not… This is not working… It’s not working! Baby, please, breathe! Don’t do this to me!”

His sheer desperation made Akira flinch.

“Mike… Mike… let me try, I’ll be careful, I promise… I won’t hurt her.” He grabbed Michael by the shoulder and forced him to stop. He stared right into his eyes. “Let me try. You’re exhausted.”

His forehead glistening with sweat, his cheeks flushed, Mike sank back on his heels as Akira gently moved Lisa’s body and started chest compression again. Michael just stayed there, staring into space for a minute. His heartbeat echoed in his ears. While Lisa’s… Lisa’s was gone.

She was gone.

And he snapped. His hand moved on autopilot and reached for the leg holster and the handgun. He extracted the weapon. It was loaded. He switched the safety and put the muzzle in his mouth.

“No!”

Sydney’s scream didn’t even reach his consciousness. As his tongue tasted the metallic flavor of the stainless steel, his eyes moved over to Lisa once again. Akira was still performing CPR on her, but she kept being unresponsive.

Why does she look so peaceful, Michael thought, in a weird, remote, almost calm way. Why does she look like she has accomplished something, before falling asleep.

Falling asleep…

Just like he had done so many years earlier. Never to wake up again. Leaving her cold and empty. Like he felt now.

“Michael, no!”

It was Sydney’s voice once again, but he didn’t pay much attention to it. However, he met Akira’s gaze and found absolute horror in it. His ministrations slowed down almost imperceptibly and Michael blinked. As if understanding his silent plea, Akira turned back to Lisa and resumed the operation, breathing heavily, counting between gritted teeth.

“Michael, put the gun down.” Sydney showed him the palms of her hands and moved a step forward, in his direction.

It was the very first time that he saw her so scared. Mike found himself observing the whole scene as if he were an outsider. An external spectator to a show that didn’t involve him anymore. And it was odd how the cold, smooth feeling of the gun in his hand felt consoling and soothing.

Michael was enamored of life. He had loved his old life, and he had been starting to enjoy his new one, too. But not without the only person that meant the world to him. That had always meant so much. A universe where Lisa did not exist was unfathomable to him, especially then and there.

He removed the barrel of the gun from his mouth and placed it under his chin. The metal pressed against his skin. Once again, the rasping sound of the muzzle stroking his stubble felt comforting and hypnotic.

“Put that thing down… don’t do this.” Sydney advanced further and Michael pushed the muzzle harder against his throat.

“Stay where you are. Don’t come any closer.” His voice suddenly sounded very collected.

“I just want you to stop scaring me to death, Michael.”

His gun safely in place, he tilted his hand and grinned.

“Oh, the nerve… Am I scaring you, Sydney? Who the fuck cares. This is not for your benefit. Not everything revolves around you… I’m just done.” He paused. His eyes shifted on Lisa for the umpteenth time. And Lisa was still lifeless. “And you’re not gonna have the last word… that much, I can promise you. I’ll show you right away that you’re not a god… That there’s always a way out.”

“You don’t wanna do this.”

“Stop pretending to know me. You don’t.”

Sydney took a deep breath and held it for a moment.

“OK – Michael, now I want you to listen to me very carefully.”

He cocked his head to a side and watched Sydney with a mildly amused expression on his face. In a way, he found her condescending tone hilarious. She sounded if she was talking to a six-year-old.

“This is not necessary. We can fix this. I can clone a new one for you. A better one. As long as you promise me that you’ll stay here with me.”

Once again, she moved a step in his direction and Michael’s finger shifted from the trigger guard to the trigger.

Sydney froze, her eyes widening.

“You gotta be fucking kidding me. I said, don’t come any closer.”

Another moment of silence while he contemplated his next move. As he felt Lisa’s essence fade away, farther and farther from him. From everything. As the whole world became increasingly colorless and uninteresting.

Lisa’s words echoed in his mind.

“…you said, endlessly. In your letter… you said endlessly, Mike.”

It was the truth. He closed his eyes for a moment and shook his head.

“I’m tired…”

It was nothing but a whisper, and his finger curled against the trigger.

“OK, that’s it. That is enough.”

Those words managed to startle him and Mike opened his eyes again. It was Maddix’s voice, this time.

Maddix, looking pale and shaken and terrified. Up until that point, he had been frozen in place but now he moved, and he did it so fast that neither Michael or Akira couldn’t understand what was going on before it was done. However, when his gaze shifted from Maddix to Sydney, Mike understood that she knew what would happen next. The defeated, resigned expression on her face, her stance, suddenly shrunken, were hard to miss.

It all happened in the bat of an eyelid.

Maddix moved a couple of steps toward Synapse, put his hand on the scanner on the smooth white surface and an electronic drawer unlocked and slid open. There was another touchscreen, a very tiny one this time. He rested his thumb on it and the machine let out a “whoosh.” It wasn’t exactly a sound. It sounded almost like a breath.

And a second later, Lisa’s body started to shake, as if electrocuted from the inside. Akira removed his hands from her chest and sat back on his heels.

“What the fuck are you doing?”

Mike aimed the gun at Maddix. His face showed his complete mistrust and he knew that he would be more than capable of shooting his old friend if only he deemed it necessary.

“Stop it. Stop right there.”

And Maddix… Well, he just extracted a handkerchief from his jacket and dabbed the sweat off his forehead. He also took off his glasses and squinted against the white lights of the lab.

“You don’t want me to stop, Mike… believe me…” He sounded exhausted, more than fed up.

And then Lisa took in a deep, loud breath and her eyes snapped open. She looked and sounded like someone who was just reemerging from the sea after spending a little too much time trapped underwater. Her blue irises were glassy and bloodshot, her face pale, her lips almost white, but she was alive.

Michael stared down at her, his mouth agape, while slowly lowering the gun. He watched her swallow again and again, glancing around the room as if wondering where she was, what had just happened and why everyone was looking at her.

He let go of his weapon and crawled over to her, still on his knees, the handgun forgotten on the white floor.

“Lisa… Lise, Lise…” He touched her head, then her face, very gently. He teared up and let out a sob that sounded almost like a laugh. “Baby…”

She swallowed again, breathing through her mouth, and grabbed his wrist. She was weak and debilitated and possibly still a bit disoriented, but the tight grip on his hand made Mike’s soul soar. He smiled through the tears.

Lisa squeezed her eyes shut for a quick moment, then let out a feeble smile.

“Hi,” she mouthed, and he sobbed again. Then he just bent over her, kissing her lips, very softly.

“Hey, yourself…”

Then he took her in his arms and rocked her in a slow, soothing rhythm that, at that very moment, he needed more than she did.

Akira got up from the floor and walked over to where Maddix stood. Maddix was still very pale, one hand resting, palm flat, on Synapse. He was shaking from head to toe and looked on the verge of fainting.

Akira eyed him suspiciously.

“Hey… you gonna pass out?”

Maddix just shook his head, lowering his eyes.

“What did you do?”

“I stopped this madness. I’m the one who designed Synapse. And there’s an emergency procedure set in place in case of… “ He couldn’t bring himself to say the words out loud. “Let’s just say that it’s possible to reverse some… ah… malfunction… to an extent, at least. I think we made it just in time.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose.

“So, anyway… Borealis1 is not working anymore on her, now… Her… uhm… momentary deactivation disabled it forever.”

“But not Jewel++…”

He looked up and stared at Akira.

“No, Jewel++ is still working… in both of them. And it will keep functioning for several minutes even after their… eh, permanent deactivation… because of its small internal power supply unit.”

“I was right… turning off the brain for a few minutes could disable that thing.”

Maddix nodded his head tiredly.

“You were right, yeah.”

“So… Is your boss gonna pull shit like that again?”

Akira glanced over at Sydney and frowned. She now sat in one of the chairs, looking completely deflated. Her alien-like eyes were spent, staring into space. She was lost in her own world. She knew that the game was over.

“No… because she can’t anymore. And I’m not sure she would, anyway… She… I don’t want to believe she’s that evil. I’ve known Miss Bankmann for years, and I think with Lisa, it was a sort of spur-of-the-moment decision… But she is obsessed and potentially dangerous… I get that now.”

“She’s unhinged.”

Maddix just shook his head again, uncomfortably.

“I don’t know what else to say. I didn’t sign up for this. I’m just a lab tech. I never meant any harm. I had no idea…”

Suddenly, he realized Michael and Lisa were still there and walked over to them, crouching down.

Mike, still holding Lisa in his arms, just stared at him coldly.

“I don’t expect you to thank me…”

“Good… ‘cause I’m not going to.”

Lisa, still too worn out to speak, just stroked Michael’s chest, then closed her fist in the fabric of his shirt. Her eyes stayed on Maddix, and she watched him with quite a neutral expression.

“But you can tell me what changed your mind.”

Maddix shrugged his shoulders and put on his glasses again.

“Her dying? I like Miss Lisa. And you. Like I said, it was never my intention to hurt anyone. I thought I was doing something good. And I thought Miss Bankmann was, too.” He chewed on his lip. “I was wrong, Mike… And, well… remember Angela?”

“Yeah. What about her…” Michael’s cold voice couldn’t hide his prudence. He still didn’t trust Maddix. He couldn’t.

“Well, now I think that love is a bit more than a mammalian drive. I mean, I’m not entirely sure of how I feel, but as Lisa lay there, I started thinking about what it would mean to me if anything like that happened to my fiancée. And I realized how fallacious my axiom was…”

“What axiom?”

“I was convinced that clones were a little less than human beings. Then, for a moment, you guys became nothing but a figment of Sydney’s imagination… Nothing but a special project… something to take pride in… And then eventually… It just occurred to me that you’re just… people. Real people. Perhaps more ancient and more real than anyone of us will ever be.”

Mike didn’t comment.

Maddix tilted his head to a side and stared at Lisa.

“I’m sorry you had to go through all this. You were always so nice to me.” His brow furrowed. “How do you feel?”

Lisa just squeezed her eyes shut for a moment and smiled faintly, then gave him the thumb up. Maddix smiled tiredly, then nodded his head. He touched his holowatch and the doors unlocked.

“Alright… I think it’s best if you all just leave, now…” He stood up and glanced over at Sydney. She looked catatonic. “I’m gonna take care of her.”

“Isn’t she gonna try to stop us?”

Mike scooped Lisa up with no effort and rose to his feet. Automatically, she wrapped her arm around his neck and rested her head against his shoulder. Her eyes closed again.

“I don’t think so, no.” Maddix pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “I’ll make sure she doesn’t do anything stupid, anyway.”

“Mike… Time to go. Move your ass.”

Akira’s deep voice snapped Michael out of his temporary suspension. He just glanced at Maddix and Sydney one last time and then, holding Lisa in his arms, he followed Aki toward the exit of the lab.

Sydney’s voice reached them all as the door slid open.

“If you’re leaving, it’s only because I’m letting you go. Just know that. Do your thing. Do what you want. But remember – no matter how normal your life looks, you’ll never be completely human. And you’ll never give birth to any child… because you’re both sterile. And you’ll stay that way.” She laughed, but it didn’t sound believable at all. Not even to her. “You’re lucky I didn’t give you an expiration date… or maybe I did?”

Akira glared at her on his way out.

“Oh, fuck off…”

In the flycar, they stayed silent for several minutes. Michael sat in the back seats, refusing to let Lisa go, and kept holding her in his arms even after it was clear that she had fallen asleep.

“Maybe we should take her to the hospital…” He gently tucked a strand of hair behind her ear as he watched her sleep. “You sure she ain’t got no broken ribs? You’re a darn bulldozer…”

Akira sneered, his eyes fixed on the aeroroad as they descended from Level 4 to Level 3.

“Fuck outta here. You underestimate my famous self-control and my innate gentleness. I was cautious… so don’t worry, she’s fine. Worst case scenario, she’s gonna feel a bit sore once she wakes up again. But also all gooey inside because I’m special. Plus, you guys don’t seem to realize how enhanced and improved you are, compared to us normal folks… I mean, that crazy bitch up there surely did her absolute best to make her toys perfect.”

“Can you not call us that?” Michael’s protest was half-hearted at best. His lips stayed pressed on Lisa’s warm forehead.

“Sure, but you know I’m right. You really think someone who’s had an unexpected cardiac arrest would wake up just like she did? Like that?” He snapped his fingers. “Mike… I’m not sure CPR would have saved her. Maddix did something to… reactivate her. I don’t know if you noticed, ’cause you were too busy playing cray-cray cowboy, but it looked like an on/off sorta thing. And not only was she cognizant right away, but also all in all OK… and now she’s asleep as if nothing happened! She is one powerful lady! So… she’s fine. You both will be.”

Michael took a deep breath.

“I get your point. Really, I do. But it’s still scary. The complete control she had over us. We were like… battery-powered…”

“Toys.”

He just shook his head and Akira shrugged.

“Well, no more, right? You’re free. She can still watch you guys using her little Jewel++ thingy? Who the hell cares. Let her choke on that.”

A long, poignant silence followed. When Michael spoke again, he was staring at the rain hammering the flycar windows.

“You think what she said is true?”

“What exactly? She said a lot of bullshit.”

“…”

“You mean the part about your offspring? …Or the expiration date?”

“Both.”

Aki scratched his bearded chin as he kept driving, flying in the dark cityscape illuminated by flashing neon signs.

“Hard to say. It seems to me that she just wanted to taunt you. So juvenile. As if all of us didn’t have an expiration date. Anyway… maybe you shouldn’t take that baggage with you, now that you’re leaving for Zariah3…” His brow furrowed. “…You’re still gonna leave, right?”

“Yeah.”

“OK… I’ll miss you both.”

“Yeah… we’ll miss you too.”

Lisa woke up about ten minutes later, surrounded by the comforting sound of the rain drumming all over the flycar as they kept descending. Michael’s dark eyes were the first thing she saw. His gaze was there, waiting for her and she blinked, realizing that she was still in his arms and that he had never let her go, not even for a moment.

After resuscitation, she had felt cold and numb. Her body was trembling and weak. Now she could almost feel the blood running in her veins again – the complete awareness of being alive nestled in the warmth of Mike’s body connected to hers. The fleetingness and intensity of life. The importance of living it fully, realizing that it could end in the blink of an eyelid.

Michael narrowed his eyes as he kept staring at her quietly and Lisa saw the ancientness of their long, duplicitous existences reflected in his dark irises. They had reached their destination and it was singular how different they had been, only a handful of months earlier. And how they had been nothing but ashes for a very long time before then.

Finally feeling a bit more like herself, she reached up and raked her fingers through Mike’s hair, on the back of his head, then pulled his face closer. She started kissing him ever so slightly. His forehead, his closed eyelids, his cheeks, his lips. Just wanting to comfort and soothe him, because she had seen how shocked and overwhelmed he was, when she had awakened again.

“How are you feeling?” He held her chin gently, his inquisitive gaze inspecting her face. “You look better.”

“I am better. Just tired.” Oh, good. Her voice had come back, and now even inhaling and exhaling didn’t feel like breathing fire.

“You scared the crap out of me, Lise…” He watched her lovingly. Thoughtfully. “Sydney offered to create another version of you for me, you know that?”

Lisa gave him a crooked smirk, and he smiled.

“Really? You should have said yes, you big dummy… Sounds like a real bargain for a change.”

Michael made a face.

“Nah. I think I’m gon’ keep this loud, pigheaded, fearless version of you.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah…” One more kiss. “Plus, you said eternally, Lise. And I’m going to take your word for it.”

He pulled back, his face turning serious. They were making light of everything that had happened, and it indeed was a good thing, but that didn’t erase anything and she needed to know something. Something just as crucial as their playful bantering.

“I wasn’t ready to say goodbye…”

Lisa took a deep breath. Her hand came up again, touching his face.

“I wasn’t either, when you left…” She bit her lip. “I realized that we say goodbye all the time, but we never know which one is going to be the last. And maybe I never thought there would be a last time, you know…”

Michael wasn’t sure he could talk about that in detail. Not at the moment, at least.

“What did you see?” He turned his face and kissed the palm of her hand, comforted by how warm and alive it felt. “While you were gone, I mean…”

She narrowed her eyes, staring into space for a moment.

“I don’t remember. But I know that I was waiting for you. No matter how long it would take to see you again. I would have waited.”

Electron Enterprises, fourteen days later

She stood on the vast rooftop terrace of the building. One of the most beautiful locations in New York, mainly because it was home to a real garden, with real flowers – the rarest on Earth, coming from every corner of the planet – and actual trees. A spectacular point of observation, almost on top of the world. A place where even she felt at peace.

The last couple of weeks had been rough for Sydney. For the first time in her life, she had resorted to medications to be able to sleep. The memory of Michael’s body in her bed too vivid to allow her mind to rest. Everything had been hard. Getting up in the morning, going to work, going back to her old life, the way it was before Project Orpheus became something more than a thrilling idea in her mind.

Before Lisa and Mike became real. Flesh and bones. Mind and soul. Past and present.

Wearing a perfect, cream-white business suit, her arms folded over her chest, Sydney Bankmann walked through the flowers and the grass and the bushes and the trees. She was an indoor person, she had never been attracted to the outside world, but that evening, she had to admit that being on that rooftop, breathing what possibly was the cleanest air in the megacity, observing the sky turn purple before the usual night rain arrived, felt magical. And it made her feel more at peace than she had been in a very long time.

The breeze caressed her platinum-white hair and she closed her eyes, savoring the sensation of being enveloped by the light, safe in the impalpable embrace of the universe. She hadn’t thought it would get better, but it had finally happened. And now, as her mind replayed the last events in a never-ending loop, she became able to observe things from an external point of view.

It was an interesting perspective.

She knew that she had committed an unspeakable crime, by turning off Lisa. And she knew that she would not have been brave enough to turn her on again, if Maddix hadn’t stepped in. Resurrecting Lisa would have meant admitting how wrong she had always been – and Sydney could only do so much to invalidate what she had always thought of herself. But she knew that her actions had been incomprehensible, and now she wondered.

Why?

What had motivated her? What had been going on inside her head? How had she gone from smart and nerdy and generous to vindictive and jealous and vicious? Had she been so isolated from everything that life was about? So disenfranchised? So utterly lost?

And above everything else… Had she been triggered or, all in all, deep down she had always been a monster?

Those were all fascinating questions. And she was aware that having them was a good thing. She had also tried to do something more than just put her brain to work. She had tried to live – without the project, without Lisa and Mike. A couple of days earlier, she had finally accepted Feeney’s umpteenth invitation for a drink and he had ended up in her bed.

As he fucked her, Sydney had felt nothing. No warmth, no passion, no arousal, no fulfillment. His sweaty body had disgusted her. The smell of his skin had made her feel nauseous. His words and constant bragging had bored her almost to tears. And so she had sent him away. And then she had taken some medications, just to be able to sleep for a few hours. Possibly, to forget about all that had just happened.

There was a missing link in her. The realization was startling. Her mind was in the right place, or had been going in the right direction lately, but everything else that made her, her, was simply missing in action. She had doubted Mike and Lisa had the ability and competence to be completely human, while in fact it was she, who was nothing but a bundle of nerves, muscles, bones, fluids.

She lowered her eyes and smiled. A sad, lost smile. Empty.

Then she touched the earpiece that she was wearing.

“Any news?”

[Jewel++: Subjects 1 and 2 have left the planet, boss.]

She looked up again and kept her eyes fixed on the purple landscape, her face a collected mask.

“Details, please.”

[Jewel++: Mr. and Mrs. Jackson are two of the three hundred and twenty-nine passengers boarded on trans-planetarian spaceflight ENC58, which originated in New York Megacity and is bound to land on Zariah3.]

Sydney inhaled a deep, shaky breath.

“Mr. and Mrs… Jackson?”

[Jewel++: Correct. Planet policy on Zariah3 only allows family units to apply for legal residence. According to the check-in files, Subject 1 and Subject 2 got married nineteen days ago on Level 1. They do have the proper authorization to inhabit the orbital planet permanently.]

“So… theirs are one-way tickets?”

[Jewel++: Correct, boss.]

Sydney bowed her head.

“I understand… How long until you lose connection for good?”

[Jewel++: The connection was permanently severed 68 seconds ago, boss.]

“So that means that you can’t give me any more information about their future movements and current whereabouts?”

It was a rhetorical question. She already knew the answer.

[Jewel++: Correct. It is safe to assume they will be on board for another 8 hours and 29 minutes, boss.]

She scoffed.

“Yes, of course. You’re the first opinionated AI ever created, aren’t you?”

[Jewel++: Question unclear. Please, elaborate, boss.]

“It doesn’t matter. Forget about it…”

[Jewel++: Do you want me to erase the last question from my memory, boss?]

Sydney removed the earpiece and turned it off, then crouched on the lawn and rested it in the grass.

She rose to her feet again and smoothed down her blazer. Then she walked over to the perimeter parapet. It was a beautiful, rock-solid glass structure that allowed the vision to never stop, to never have boundaries, to move smoothly from the rooftop garden to the rest of the universe.

She climbed on top of it and let herself fall from the 74th floor.

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