The movie stopped, and she watched it again. She didn’t understand a lot of the words the man and the woman had said. Chicago? Asteroid? NASA? Washington?
She clicked on the other image, and the animation opened again, showing the orbits of the planets and the flashing dots. She now knew what she was looking at. Those eighty years—or two hundred and thirty-two—had elapsed, and these things were coming fast.
She whipped out her personal recording device. The room’s technology was so old that she couldn’t find a way to pair her PRD with the screen itself, so she had to settle for just using her camera. She filmed the animation, then the two movies.
Plugged into the upright machine was a small metal-and-plastic device. It glowed along one side. She found several more in one of the drawers. On one end of each device was a shiny metal plug. She grabbed all of them and pulled the other one out of the machine. Something beeped when she did. In the drawers beneath the little devices was a small binder full of gleaming discs. She put that in her bag as well.
She was just figuring out how to detach the machine itself when she heard shuffling on the floor above. She froze. She guessed that someone was coming down the hallway that led to the dead man’s living pod. Only two people would use that hallway: another cleaner or one of her employers. Maybe they were checking up on her progress. If they found her down here . . . She shuddered. She slung her bag over her shoulder and raced through the doorways back the way she’d come.
Chapter 4
When H124 reached the rubble at the bottom of the hole, she stood, listening. All she could hear were the building’s ventilation humming and the distant sounds from the neighbor’s display. She climbed the pile of old rubble and peeked out into the man’s living pod. She tensed, listening. Nothing unusual met her ears. The body still lay in the middle of the hallway, sealed inside the body bag. The smell of bleach hung heavily in the air. She didn’t catch the sound of any more footsteps. Maybe they’d gone past this place, heading for a different living pod.
She pulled herself out and quickly replaced the floorboards, slinging the carpet back in place. The foreign devices weighed heavily in her bag, even though she knew they were only a couple of ounces. She had to get out of there fast.
She strapped the body bag to her harness and began dragging the man down the hall. She peered out through the hole in the wall. The neighbor still sat on his couch, display gleaming in front of him. He entered text in one small window while watching a show about two girls shopping in a megamall.
He didn’t turn as she hefted the body through the hole and hurried toward his front door. She started to close her eyes to use the theta wave receiver to open the door, but instead leaned forward, staring through the peephole. The hallway was clear. She sent the message to the TWR to unlock the door, and it hissed open. Glancing up and down the empty hall, she lugged the body out, dragging it along the floor. The incinerator stood at the end. She bent with the effort, clenching her teeth. Her mind sped along, wondering what to do. Her body was on autopilot, dragging the corpse toward the incinerator the way she had countless times before in other living pods. The corridor lighting flickered overhead. If she told her employers about the asteroid, they’d know that she had been exploring, not just doing her job. She’d heard about other people who got distracted from their day-to-day tasks. Some were repurposed, moved into other, more menial positions. Others simply vanished. She knew she couldn’t tell them. Even if they listened, could she trust them to go to Public Programming Control so they could broadcast the information? Her best bet was to go straight to the PPC herself. After she incinerated the body, she’d head to the media building, and her employers would be none the wiser.
At the end of the hall, she stopped in front of the incinerator’s TWR. She sent the thought for it to open, and a gleaming metal door slid open on the burner. An incinerator stood on every other floor of each residential building. It was easier that way. She unclipped the harness and stepped out of it. Unzipping the bag, she took one last look at the man and his head wound. Then she rolled him into the furnace and commanded the door to slide back, closing him inside. She sent the mental command to burn. She packed up the body bag, straps, and harness, returning them to her tool bag.
At the exit door, she used the TWR to open it, and a gust of hot air swept over her from the outside.
She didn’t see the men until the outside door hissed closed behind her. Then she saw them, one at the end of the street, the other only a dozen feet away, staring at her. The closer one pulled out a gleaming metal tool and advanced. She recognized the black uniform, the armbands with the red insignia, the wide-brimmed hats worn low over their eyes. They were Repurposers, and they’d come for her.
Chapter 5
For a terrifying moment H124 froze. The man with the gleaming tool met her eyes. His face was unnaturally pale, dark eyes glistening beneath a crop of short black hair. His black suit blended in with the shadows, and his face seemed to glow. The other Repurposer moved behind him, two more joining them from the shadows. She stood at the top of the cement stairs, a metal railing at her back.
The men advanced, and she forced her feet to move. Turning, she vaulted over the railing and landed hard on the asphalt beneath. She cracked her knee, but got to her feet quickly, taking off. Her tool bag slammed against her side. It was too heavy. She thought of ditching it, but she couldn’t lose what she’d found.
Ahead of her towered the other residential buildings of New Atlantic. Her ability to use the TWRs would get her into any of them, but she knew that the Repurposers used them, too. They’d be able to see that someone had passed through the door recently, and could use it to track her. She wondered if they were tracking her even now through her PRD. She pulled it out of her pocket and switched it off.
She had to think of something, maybe find a door that didn’t require a TWR to open. She knew that would be more likely in the older part of town, so she raced east. The city’s floating light orbs provided scant illumination above her, casting everything in a sickly orange glow.
Her boots pounded on the pavement, the noise alarmingly loud to her. They’d hear her. She chanced a look behind and saw the three running in the shadows, closing in. She darted down an alley between two of the residential skyscrapers, the stench of uncompacted trash assailing her senses.
Normally the trash dispensers came through and destroyed the garbage nightly, but they must not have come through yet. She leaped over the waste, smelling offal and excrement and blood. The end of the alley branched off into three separate passages. She shot left, trying to keep buildings between her and her pursuers.
The bag slammed against her back as she ran. She wasn’t going to make it if she didn’t ditch it. She rounded a corner, then another, heading deep into the labyrinth of residential complexes. She turned every chance she got so she wouldn’t be in the men’s direct line of sight.
Her lungs gulped for air. Why did they want her? What had she done wrong? Did they know she’d taken a break from her work and explored under the man’s living pod?
Her foot skidded on something slimy in the trash heaps, and she went down hard on her back. The bag swung to the side, the strap twisting on her neck. Up ahead she saw an alcove in the wall, an old battered metal door without an electronic lock. She scrabbled to her feet and ran for it. She pushed its battered handbar, but it was locked. She ran ahead, pressed against the wall behind a mound of trash, and listened. The footsteps were close, but she’d gained ground on her pursuers. They must have taken a few wrong turns. She kept running, turning left and right so many times, she knew she’d have to use her PRD if she ever wanted to navigate back to her quarters.
Then it hit her.
She could never go back to her quarters.
Her