“I’ve had death threats before,” Jessica said. She only realized after she said it that she had put on the dismissive tone she used for combative interviewees.
“You’ve never had anybody kill a pig to demonstrate, though,” Merida said. She bit her lip.
“I know.”
Jessica stared at the pig. The point-of-view had returned to the underside of the animal with its gaping abdomen cavity and hanging entrails. “I can’t worry about this right now. I’ve got an interview with one of the doctors at Artemis in the morning. I need to get to sleep.”
Comments started to appear under the Shout.
heavenlyhoney88: poor pig
bmx7990: damn dude
justasweetvirgin: i’d be scared if i was jesica brantly
progressalwayswins: Right on. She should be ashamed of herself. All she’s doing is feeding the bigotry in this country.
hellodolly: lol he killd that pig just to call this chick out??????!!!!!!!!
But then the whole window turned gray and disappeared, replaced with a message from Agora:
THIS SHOUT HAS BEEN FLAGGED AS OFFENSIVE OR THREATENING BY OUR TEAM. VIEW POST ANYWAY?
“I’m going to have a glass of wine and go to bed,” said Jessica. “If you come over, I won’t get any sleep.”
“Have fun,” said Merida. She bit her lip again and glanced at the cooks and servers moving around behind her.
“Maybe tomorrow night, though,” Jessica said, forcing a smile. “We can drink and dance and have drunk sex on my couch. I’ll probably need it. I’m interviewing a doctor at Artemis about that John Doe case.”
“Hey,” she said. “My sister had her kid at Artemis. Who’s the doctor you’re seeing?”
“Hayden.”
Merida smiled again. “I remember him. I hope he takes off his lab coat. He’s got a great ass.” She looked away as if daydreaming about Dr. Hayden, but then she looked at Jessica again and put on a stern face. “But I don’t want any reason to be jealous, so never mind. Make sure you wear something ugly.”
“Oh, please,” said Jessica, and she ended the call and shut down the projector. For several minutes she just stared at the empty space where the holograms had hovered in the air over her coffee table, the image of the dead pig burned into her mind like an afterglow.
3
Val was on top of Kim and close to an orgasm when it happened. Kim’s strong surgeon’s hands gripped her hips, helping her move against him. Both of their bodies shuddered. She craned her neck, catching her lower lip between her teeth. Her head feeling light, she put her hands on his chest, ready to let herself go.
Then the bedroom door burst open behind her.
Val screamed and threw herself off her husband. In one swift movement, she rolled off of the bed, wrenched open her nightstand drawer, yanked out her old Remington .45. Her body still trembling with the interrupted climax, she aimed the gun at the door. Her knees shook and her head swam. But her military training hadn’t left her even after all these years.
A man stood at her door wearing black tactical gear.
“What the…?” gasped Kim.
The man stepped into the room, his face shrouded behind a black riot helmet. Behind him, two more men loomed in the darkness of the hallway. Each of them carried M4 carbines—except that the barrels were longer than any M4 she had seen.
“Get the hell out of my house,” she said.
“Val...” said Kim from beside her.
She aimed her pistol at the small space between the first man’s chest armor and his face-shield. The man didn’t move.
“Val, don’t,” said Kim. For a second Val was furious that he could be so calm. “It’s not... There’s no one there.”
Val looked at her husband, who knelt on her side of the bed, his hand reaching out to her. Gently, he touched her forearm and pushed it down so the gun pointed at the floor.
“But—”
She looked back at the door. The men were gone.
“It’s not real,” said Kim, pleading.
She stole a glance at him, then back toward the door. Three new men stood side-by-side inside the room. They wore black suits with ties and audio earpieces on their left ears.
“You’ll have to come with us,” one said.
“You’re sick,” said another.
“But we’ll fix you,” said the third, who drew a syringe filled with a bright red liquid from his breast pocket. It took everything in Val’s power not to raise her gun and put a shot into each of their foreheads.
“Give me the gun,” said Kim, his voice almost a whisper. “It’s not real. It’s another dream.”
A wave of terror that wasn’t her own swept through her, and she knew he was right. She handed Kim the .45 and pulled on her big sleeping T-shirt and underwear. Her groin still ached.
He’s so afraid, she thought, passing through the three nightmare men and opening the bedroom door.
When she reached Braden’s room, she nearly screamed again. More men than could possibly fit in the bedroom surrounded Braden’s bed. The crowd seemed to extend past the walls. Some carried automatic rifles and wore tactical gear. Others wore suits and ties and had unreadable ID badges hanging from their lapels. Several wore silvery hazmat suits or lab coats. Others were just dark shapes in the cool glow of Braden’s nightlight. Their heads nearly touched the ceiling.
Val tried to force her way into the room, but her leg muscles wouldn’t respond. She slapped herself across the face and gripped the flesh of her bare thighs, digging into the skin with her fingernails. The pain both loosened her feet and drove away the crowd of giant men threatening her son. She crossed the room to his bed and turned on his lamp.
“Braden?” she said, kneeling beside him.
He lay on his side, facing her. His eyes twitched rapidly under the eyelids, but otherwise he didn’t move. Val grasped his shoulder and shook him slightly.
“Wake up,” she said.
A burst of blinding light lit up her head, and now she was standing under a gray sky on a dirt road that cut through a forest of impossibly tall trees. She watched a vehicle drive away from her. Kim’s car, leaving her behind. Her own face appeared in the back window, looking back at her.
“Come back!” she screamed in Braden’s voice. She tried to run after the car, but again she found her feet unable to move. The road was so long and straight that she could see the car and her own face looking back at her for miles. It was as if it would never leave her sight, but she would never be able to reach it, either.
“Mom?”
And just like that, she was back in her son’s bedroom. The trees, the shadows of a forest, the crunch of dirt under her feet—all of it dissolved into the warm yellow light of a bedside lamp. Her hands and arms felt the soft warmth of Braden’s Star Wars comforter. His small brown eyes looked at her from his freckled face. Kim sat on the side of Braden’s bed, gripping the boy’s shoulder.