Chapter 11

Nia, July 8, 3110 CE

Mauve's laughter called us to her before any naming. She laughed from her belly and her throat at the same time. The first was a feeling and the second was a sound.

She pointed at an enlarged square of light on the wall under her control. We watched Lathe stride down a corridor through its fisheye. Mauve shrank the square as he walked out of view and enlarged one of the Counselor in a private office.

The Counselor kept a line of red and white flowers in tan clay pots against the window wall at the side of her desk. Dark red potted flowers hung from the ceiling along the other three walls walls. A water bottle sat on her desk between an automated handheld fan and an active tablet. The Counselor stood behind the desk using the stylus as a conductor's baton to flick through her wall screen. Her log floated over her shoulder.

The door slid open and Lathe entered. He spoke only after it shut. We couldn't hear their conversation but none of us dared to break the silence.

The Counselor or maybe simply Morrow lowered her arms. The stylus shook between her fingers as she touched it to her tablet. The words in the email were too small to read. Mauve took a screenshot and passed the image to a smaller square of light at the corner of her own wall.

The stylus fell onto the table beside the tablet. We could almost hear its tinkling clatter. Morrow's head dropped with her arms. They hung frozen rather than limp.

Lathe continued to speak. He stepped forward when anyone else would've stepped back.

Morrow lashed out an arm. Lathe slammed into the door. It rattled behind him and the wall above cracked all the way the to the ceiling.

The line of potted flowers crashed down. They broke against him and shattered against the floor. The shards cut blood from his skin. It ran red down his body and black where it seeped into the dark soil.

Morrow's arm hung in the air. Her hand dropped from the wrist. Her arm followed from the shoulder. This time it swung limp.

She collapsed into the swivel chair behind her but hit the seat at an odd angle. The chair tipped forward. She landed hard on the tiles. The back of the chair smacked the top of her head. The desk now sat like the wall of a child's imaginary fort between Morrow and Lathe.

Lathe shook his head and rained flowers and dirt onto the floor. He pushed himself up on shaky hands and knees. The soil fell off him in the shape of a crouched shadow but left him covered in an unshakeable dust.

Lathe backed into the door. It slid open behind him. He backed out. A bot shaped like a wastebin entered the office at the same time. It sprouted many tubes and touched them to the fallen flowers, soil, and pot shards. The door slid shut as it vacuumed.

Morrow reached up her arms and pushed the chair to the side. She brought in her knees and rested her forehead against them. She laced her fingers over her head.

Mauve exploded with laughter and we jumped. Bevel and I jumped. The Head sat with their legs over one arm of their swivel chair as they had since entering the room.

Mauve's face showed her great want and need for Morrow's loss but this didn't feel like a laughing moment. I felt sorry for Morrow. I knew we'd sometimes bothered Morrow. Even so she'd never been anything but civil. She'd let Agreeance attack Enid right in front of Myrddin and me which hadn't been very nice. But she'd been very civil about it.

Mauve minimized the square with Morrow but didn't send it to a corner. She pulled up the screenshot and enlarged it. The fisheye clarified it to its maximum zooming but it was still a little blurry. She opened a command window and input her line on a virtual, 3D keyboard. She dropped the zoomed screenshot into the program in a new square and a readable version appeared beside it:

Morrow,

Sorry for the short notice, but having reviewed Mauve's performance as Sovereign in my absence, it seems she's a better fit for Counselor under my form of rule. She's being promoted as you read this.

You've always been a capable servant of Loegria which is why, rather than being dismissed entirely, you've been appointed co-vice counselor.

I suggest you and Vivid meet with the new counselor at the earliest convenience to work out the delegations of duties.

Thank you for your continued service to our great nation,

Alter

Mauve turned to us with a lipless grin and reached out her arms with opened palms. Neither the Head nor Bevel moved. I placed both my palms over hers. I didn't agree with her happiness but I couldn't let her moment stretch into awkwardness.

Mauve clasped my hands and swung us around in a full circle before breaking away. She skipped to the door and whirled out. Her robes flared after her like purple wings attached at her hips.

Bevel and I exchanged glances with each other and head turns with the Head. Mauve stretched a single arm back into the room. She beckoned us with her manicured finger.

Mauve returned to her seat behind the floating black marble of the Round Table. The Head stood behind and to her left. Bevel sat on her right forever clutching their tablet and stylus. Now I had a seat on the other side of Bevel. Morrow and Vivid stood at the far end of the table. Morrow had recently reapplied her make-up.

Mauve invited them to sit. Vivid pulled up a chair. She put her blue-nailed hand on Morrow's arm but Morrow didn't move. Vivid got up and pulled a chair over for Morrow. She took Morrow's arm and guided her into the black half-moon. Morrow hadn't once blinked.

'Thanks for your prompt response. I'll return the favor by getting straight to business.' Mauve opened a file on their side of the 3D display at the core of the table.

It appeared to us backward as though it hung inside a mirror. I had to focus for left to right letters to stay in place. I had no idea where to begin with these but I took a pic with Benzene. I'd messaged my family's desktops to ask them to supper with me. I'd show them then.

'Let me know if you have any questions.'

Inner revulsion twisted Morrow's face as though she'd put her skin through the garbage disposal before putting it on. It wound her face into many fleshy horns and left raw, torn holes over the red muscle. I could see her tongue scraping the roof of her mouth back and forth through the hole in her upper lip and cheek.

Her tongue froze. Her face fleshed back to a beaming smile as I blinked. She looked so normal that I couldn't tell if she smiled on the inside or outside.

'No, no questions. Vivid?'

Vivid couldn't think of any.

Morrow stood up. 'If that's all, I shall report to my new station.'

Mauve dismissed them both. She was on her feet as soon as the door shut. She crossed her arms and leaned back against the table. Morrow's sudden change in mood bothered her. I think it bothered all of us.

'Gaunt, delete any footage of our little excursion this morning.'

The Head gave her a gloved thumbs up. They had already substituted the video with old clips.

'Bevel, tell Alter to destroy the bots who know the whereabouts of the lab.'

'Why do they have to be killed?' I asked. Someone could probably replace the servants' memories as easily as the Head had with the video.

'Once a memory is made, it can never be completely deleted,' said Mauve.

'That's how A.I. die, actually,' said Bevel.

They accumulated memories for hundreds of years and eventually it became too much for them. The memories and ghosts of memories leaked out and clogged other pathways. The A.I. grew slower and slower until it stopped moving at all like the cursed Tin Man.

'So Mother Lake programs them to replicate.'

I clapped my hands together. 'There are A.I. babies?'

There weren't. A.I. could have sex but always built their next generation the same as themselves. I was quite disappointed but still amazed at the beings in my new world.

I messaged Myrddin at the last minute in case he had no one to dine with him but he'd already agreed to take Morrow out with Vivid to cheer her up. I wondered if he knew that some of us still wanted to kill him a little bit.

I'd left Mauve a little early to be the first at the private conference room I'd reserved like a proper host. Baoyu had left even earlier. He leaned against the white paint wall behind a bright wooden chair. He smiled and waved. He couldn't see Benzene because I'd put my log away.

'This was a good idea,' he said.

I only knew that it was something I didn't want to go without.

Enid walked in and flung her gym bag down the empty length of the table. It hit the end wall with a swoosh of air and a fabric sag. She hadn't even looked. She pulled out a chair opposite me and threw a leg over one side and then the other as though it were a saddle. The chairs on either side of her scooted themselves away from her powerful legs.

Baoyu immediately switched his focus to her. He asked her how often she went to the gym. I knew she went every day excepting a few monthly rest days.

She'd taken me to the gym when I asked to go with her. She warned me never to do the same workout twice in a row. Then she worked me out so hard I never asked again. I'd always wondered if she'd done it on purpose.

Manon didn't glance up from texting on their tablet with one hand. They sat in the first chair on the right across from Baoyu. They stuck the stylus on the back of the tablet and moved them to the side but within reach of their right hand. They looked up.

Baoyu and I gasped. Manon's unpainted face almost glowed. Not in the scary way that Morrow glowed.

'I told Morgue about the dick move Myrddin pulled, so she took me out for a spa day. Pretty sure the masseuse was legit punching my back at some point, but I feel amazing right now.'

I told them that they looked amazing. I'd never seen anyone look like that outside of filters and proper lighting.

Baozhu arrived with the Sovereign at their side. The Sovereign waved at us but didn't enter with Baozhu. My new younger sibling sat between Baoyu and Manon.

I stood and clapped my hands. A line of servants came through the door and filled the table with porcelain trays. They left with the dish covers.

I'd ordered 'supper for five.' They'd brought nine dishes. There was a fresh vegetable salad, a fresh fruit salad, a cooked salad, soup, bread rolls, potatoes, synthetic chicken, synthetic beef, and different colors of ice cream together in a covered glass bowl. The servants had prepared the food simply and plainly with only salt, pepper, and dried spices but left sauces in glasses shaped like wine bottles at the end of the table. The water, wine, and tea were also at the end but in glass pitchers. The servants would take anything we didn't finish to break down into things for recycling.

I told my family about Mauve's new position as Counselor as we ate. Baozhu followed my lead and explained the Sovereign's experiment.

Baoyu set down his fork and spoon from where he'd been cutting synthetic chicken. His partially open napkin hid the knife. 'That's why we can't let Alter die: they're going to bring back magic. The experiment's going to work.'

'Yeah, but only for A.I.,' said Enid around a mouthful of wilted spinach.

'That's probably just the first stage.'

'If it works, our jobs are gonna be harder by roughly a fuck ton,' said Manon. They went through half a buttered baked potato before noticing that we'd all stopped eating. 'What?'

The psibers of the Sovereign Court came to power because everyone was terrified of melties. The Sovereign believed magic could keep A.I. from melting but all the successful tests in the world couldn't convince everyone.

'It does sound like we'd be raising a magical army,' I said.

'It could happen for real, accidentally,' said Baozhu.

A.I. could use magic converted to psionics to bypass their programming. That included their code of nonviolence.

'If it's that bad, we end it now,' said Enid. Her fork rested on her plate at an angle. Her right hand grasped her knife even with her wrist flat against the table.

'This is all assuming A.I. are the ones to get magic. Maybe Alter won't take it past their cellular stage,' said Baoyu. 'Maybe they'll find a way to pass it from A.I. cells to human cells.'

'Better make sure that's how Alter does it,' Enid said to Baozhu. The knife between her fingers pointed at Baozhu from the flat of the blade.

They saluted her and promised to keep reporting.

Manon shrugged. 'It's not like people are any better.'

Enid slammed her fist in the space between them. Thankfully it was her empty left but we still jumped. The dishes rattled like the coils of a porcelain bone snake.

She pointed at Manon with the edge. 'You don't know what you're talking about.'

'Oh really, Miss hello-Myrddin-it's-murder-time.' Manon shook the red faces of both their palms at her.

Enid leapt to her feet. Her chair bounced and scuffed the wall. She gripped the knife at the level of her hips like a gun to be drawn. 'He's the murderer.'

'Wine,' said Baoyu. He floated the pitcher and poured branching red streams into everyone's glasses at the same time. 'Wine, now.'

Enid grabbed her chair by the neck and dropped into the seat. She pressed the knife flat against the table. Her left hand crossed her plate and body for the wine. She swirled it in the glass but didn't drink.

I lifted a glass to my lips but lowered it without drinking. 'Mauve thinks Morrow is up to something. I'll keep reporting on Mauve reporting on Morrow.'

'Good idea,' said Baoyu as he drank. He asked if there was anything he could do to help. He asked me.

We didn't have Myrddin to guide us but the supper had been my idea. I guessed that made me something of a leader. I had to think of something a leader would. I could only think of something Enid would.

'People who talk about A.I. often talk about Mother Lake Industries.'

Baoyu snapped the fingers of one hand and nearly upset his drink. He grinned and winced and downed it all at once to be safe. He set the glass down with his cheeks puffed like a squirrel hoarding fermented nuts. It fell over out of spite. It had nothing to spill.

'Gigi and I are right next to Records all day. I'm sure we could find something interesting just by tomorrow night.'

Manon promised to talk to Morgue about Mother Lake. Morgue might not know anything but she was bound to know people who did.

Everyone knew what they had to do except for Enid. There was no ordering her around. Words slid off her as though she'd slicked her ears with oil.

She hadn't looked up from the uneaten vegetables and synthetic beef on her plate. She'd kept the wineglass in her left hand and pressed to her forehead. She now held her fork in right like an American. She stabbed at her peas and one by one stacked the tines of the fork.

I spoke her name without thinking.

Enid raised her head just enough to stare at me from the tops of her eyes under her dark and heavy brows. I had not taken the readings of my family but her eyes and brows and sockets worked together to leave black pits. Her cheeks were almost as drawn and hollowed. The lines around her mouth were dark and deep enough for gashes. She looked like Mauve full of wanting.

I couldn't tear my eyes away. 'What will you do?'

'I'll keep an out for Ags same as always.'

Ags. She even had a revoltingly affectionate name for her good chum. I doubted it would stick once she knew what he and Manon and been up to.

Baoyu filled his glass and stood up. He refilled everyone's glass and still didn't sit. 'Nia, this was such a good idea. I vote that we make family dinners a regular thing.'

Baozhu raised their glass. 'Here, here.'

Manon laughed so hard that wine sloshed over their hand and onto the table. The table absorbed the liquid.

Manon stood up and clinked their glass with Baozhu's and Baoyu's. 'Here, here.'

We moved on to wine and ice cream. I clapped my hands for the servants. They covered our dishes and took them away. Two stayed back to offer coffee or tea from their porcelain trays.

I'd heard but never seen a person take their ice cream with a black iced coffee. The servant with coffee poured me a tall glass. I sipped it but it was too bitter. I had to chase the taste away with ice cream too quickly to enjoy it. I tried a spoonful of ice cream first but it was even more bitter as an aftertaste. I passed the glass back to the servant.

Enid snapped her fingers which drew both servants. She took my iced coffee off the tray and tipped her head back. She didn't lower the glass until she'd finished the whole thing. The glass struck the tray as loud and sharp as a slap to the ear. Somehow it hadn't touched Enid's self-satisfied smirk.

I laid my spoon in the finished position over my unfinished ice cream. I'd lost my appetite. I asked a servant for a simple, hot black tea instead.

Manon pulled out their tablet before they'd halfway finished their ice cream. They leaned on one hand and elbow. They left their spoon in their mouth to use their other hand.

Baozhu was the first to finish their ice cream and tea. They drank the last of the tea on the way out and put the cup on the servant's tray. Baoyu followed them but left their dishes on the table.

Enid asked for another iced coffee. She sipped slowly while Manon finished. Manon called the servants over to take their dishes. 'Do you mind?' They left with their tablet in hand as soon as the servants had cleared their place.

Enid was still here and I hadn't had to ask her to stay back. She must've had something to say. I looked at her. She held her palms against the dewy sides of her glass.

'Give us a moment,' she told the servants.

They left without a word. I'd never heard them speak. Maybe they hadn't been built for words.

'Nia. Where were you last night?'

Enid must've stopped by in the middle of the night to check on me. It didn't matter. I had to show Benzene to her anyone to pass along the footage. I held out my log in my hand.

'You can only get these from surgery but it's a very small surgery.'

She walked around to stand at my side leaning her hip on the table. She took Benzene and turned it around for the full view of its gold and silver. 'We're really here for good.'

'I'm not the only one taking roots.' I held out my hand. And she dropped the log back in my palm.

I activated Benzene and connected it to the wall screen in front of us. I opened the video I'd saved to the C drive folder. I muted the video and scrolled through the starting footage.

Enid saw herself and understood that Agreeance had recorded the video. She asked me where I'd gotten it.

'Agreeance shared it with his sibling and they shared it with me.'

I didn't want to go into details. She'd threatened Manon who was family with a knife and Myrddin who wasn't with death. The Head had even less relation to us than Myrddin. I hadn't actually lied besides.

I let the video play at the moment Agreeance faced the golden door. Enid saw Manon and straightened off the table. She stepped back and back again until the sides of her hands touched the wall. Her face hadn't twisted its skin into horns but I still recognized the disgust.

'Stop. Stop it.'

I did and shut off the screen. I could see the image negatives against the wall when I blinked. I looked at Enid. She stared at the empty wall with her twisted snarl as though she saw them too.

'Which sibling?'

'Gaunt.'

'I'll talk to them.' She ripped her eyes away by quarter turns. 'Nia, you have to tell Manon.'

I looked down at my palms. There was no answer to read in their emptiness. 'I can't.'

I knew Enid. Manon was family but a stranger. It was too much for me. Enid could do it. She didn't break under awkwardnesses. She broke them.

Enid told me I didn't have to say anything. She said I could just show Manon the video like I'd done with her. But it wasn't the same. Just being near enough Manon the stranger to see her horror and know I'd caused it would stomp me flat to the ground. My heart already pounded in my chest as my mind painted her horror to the back of my eyelids. It was worse than the image negatives.

I stared back at my palms. My eyes were just in time to see the sweat budding up from my pores. I couldn't close my eyes or I'd see Manon's horror. I stared up at the ceiling and its woven plant lights.

My chair quaked as Enid dropped one hand on its back and then the other. She looked down at me. Long dark strands that escaped her ponytail fell on either side of our faces. They were so long they brushed my shoulders in a black hair bridge between our bodies and the light that separated our space.

'You have to be the one.'

'Why?'

'You have the evidence and it can't come from me.'

I knew but I asked and she told me what I knew. Everyone knew she and Agreeance were close friends. They were inseparable. Her words against Agreeance might sound like a warning or a vengeance to anyone else interested in him.

'Are you interested?'

Enid tipped back her head so her laughter wouldn't fall in my face. Her hair whipped into the air with the sound like Medusa's own snakes. 'I like my men and women without a mummy complex, thanks.'

My chest hadn't felt so light since I'd escaped my diving suit and coughed up its black currant dregs. I almost regretted taking the video. My throat seized and my skin itched from the sweat seething up from beneath. It was too late.

I'd shown Enid. She'd tell Agreeance. She'd tell the Head if she could find them. They'd find out by some means. Manon would have to find out. I knew Enid would make Agreeance apologize to Manon on his knees with his head on a platter.

I grabbed the skirt of my robe in bright yellow bunches. My sweating hands would leave prints but it hardly mattered now. Drops fell onto the skirt and darkened it in spots. No self-respecting Lady Macbeth would cry into her dress. But I'd never set out to be the Lady in the first place. It'd just happened and no one would believe me.

Enid crouched at my side with one hand on my shoulder. She asked what was wrong. She didn't ask if I was alright. She knew.

'It's too much. It's too much right now.' I'd already killed my Duncan. I might as well take the crown while I could. 'I'm too weak from the surgery and too tired from all the anticipation.'

Enid sighed. I hated her for knowing my weakness so intimately that it made her sigh. It was mine but she somehow seemed to steal it with her very breath.

I let go of my dress and smoothed the wrinkles in my handprints. I counted each pass of my hands.

'You've got twenty-four hours. If you don't tell Manon by then, this'll look much worse for you then it will for me when I'm telling them.'

I didn't know anyone who'd ever had two last suppers. I looked forward to the next even less.