Chapter Nine
NEON KNIGHTS
JULY 19TH 2369
Felix and Irene draw stares as they land, one after the other. He had stayed behind her the whole way, due to his never having been to this particular town before and his insistent reluctance.
She made flying look so easy, and he’d caught him self staring at her during the journey several times.
They have arrived in the middle of a narrow street which is illuminated by the neon signs marking the many rough markets.
As they remove their helmets, they are surrounded by filthy arms holding out rusted trinkets and rotting fruit, all calling to be heard, all naming their sensational prices.
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Felix shouts to be heard.
“Why? Scared your going to get stabbed?” Irene chuckles back as she pushes her way through the crowd..
“No, not entirely,” He admits, “But should we really be leaving our work,” He pushes past more sellers, to keep up with her. “is this really the time?”
She stops at the door of some pulsing club and turns to him, putting her hand on his shoulder.
“We’ve done a lot Felix, but we need some down time to recharge, focus our attention on something else and let our sub-conscious’s work on the problems for a bit.”
Smiling, Irene pushes the door open, and he is knocked back by the sudden increase in volume.
“Isn’t that what sleep is for?” He sighs, looking back once more at the hungry eyes still swarming behind him, and forces himself inside.
Felix’s body is awash with the thumping bass, eyes blinded by smoke and lasers, and yet, he can still feel the eyes of all the patrons judging him.
Shielding his eyes from the lights, he finds Irene at the bar.
“You OK?” She shouts, he can barely make out her voice over the din.
“Yeah, fine.” He lies, shaking his head, “Just never been to a place where the music tries to hurt you.”
She laughs, and says something about not hearing. He tries to smile, squeezing one hand with his other, elbow resting on the bar.
She says something, he cups his ear.
“Drink?” She screams.
He nods and she grins, leaning over to the naked barman and orders something. Felix looks around the room but it’s like he’s in a dream, unable to make out the bobbing figures and the leering faces in any detail. Or where the walls ended and the speakers began. He grabs a stool and sits, feeling the bass vibrate through the metal as he does so.
He turns back and is greeted to a grinning beauty holding two smoking beakers.
“What are these?” He asks, their ominous promise tearing his attention from her amber eyes.
“They’re called Quasi-bone-wreckers” She yells into his ear, hurting his ear drum.
“Sounds fun.” Felix says, face frozen in a forced grin.
Before taking it, he stares into it’s smoky depths, like some kind of witches brew, but he couldn’t find it in himself to say no to her.
He takes the drink and they clink them together, she necks hers as he tries to sip his. After finishing she sees his screwed up face and grabs his arm.
“Down it!” She yells, slipping from her own stool a little.
“Fuck sake” He grumbles and does so. The drink is warm, and yet at the same time it chills his bones. His whole body is suddenly numb, his head feels light and he slides off the stool, falling to the floor.
Irene laughs and helps him back up.
“I see why they call it the Bone Wrecker.” He shouts. “You know, it reminds me of the feeling I got when I went to the future.” He turns to her, she’s smiling and nodding her head to the music, “Say, if you could travel to any point in time, any place, where would you-”
She leans in and cuts him off.
“Can’t - hear - lets - dance!”
Every nerve in his body reanimates, as if he had never had the drink. He shakes his head, his stomach clenching, hands sweating.
“No, I can’t, never-” He tries to say but she grabs his hand and drags him onto the dance floor.
He feels like he’s bumped into half the clientèle before she stops, dead center of the dance floor. He tries to speak but she’s away with the music, hands above her head, hair hanging over her swaying face, grinning like a fool.
She hadn’t taken long to get ready to leave, not as long as he’d been expecting. The only change she’d made to her appearance was to unbind her hair. This small change made her look less serious, and more free, more alive.
Clenching his damp hands Felix holds them up in front of him and steps from side to side, as his eyes dart around the room, meeting the eyes of everyone and anyone who was watching them.
Then her hands are on his and she’s trying to get him to move. They lock eyes and her face falls, he smiles but the moment has passed.
Again she drags him, thankfully away from the dance floor.
Irene leads him through some doors and down a set of stairs, into a darker and quieter room. As the doors close behind them he feels his shoulders relax as the music is cut off.
“That’s better.” Irene says, her voice now only having to cut through the persistent ringing in his ears.
She walks off, past the bar and round a corner. There, in neat rows lies a collection of various arcade machines from the last few centuries.
Felix can’t help but feel a sense of wonder and joy, like a little boy staring at the fun denied. With his ears free from the barrage they relax and he realizes there is still music playing, but it is a soft, nameless jazz piece, which eases his tension further.
“Care for a game?” Irene asks, offering him a headset.
He looks up at the title, ‘Puzzle block battle’, he mouths the words, squinting.
“You’ve never played it before?” She asks taken aback, “This is a classic, it’s like Tetris… You have played Tetris before?”
“Erm, yeah, many years ago.” He mumbles, looking over the headset.
She raises an eyebrow at him but doesn’t press the matter, instead, explains the game to him.
“Put the gloves and the headset on. Then you’ll see a 3 dimensional outline of a shape. Your goal is to fill it in using the pieces available.”
“Doesn’t sound too hard.” He says, squeezing his hand into the black gloves attached to the unit.
“There is enough pieces for both of our shapes to be completed, but, there isn’t enough for them both to be completed at the same time.”
“Ah, so we’re fighting over the pieces.”
She nods, and slides the visor on, “This should be fun.”
He puts his on and they start. At first she finishes before he can even pick up a piece, struggling just to interact with the game. But within half an hour, he’s got the meta down and is beating her at every round they play.
She removes her headset and shakes her head, he follows suit, without as much hair shaking.
“Lets play something else.” She says.
“Yeah, sure, that was fun.” He says smiling.
“Finally.” She says, looking him over.
“What?” he asks.
“I’ve found something here that’ll relax you.” Irene grins.
“Lets see you keep that smile when I beat at the next game.” Felix grins back, laughing as her face morphs into one of mock horror.
***
After a few hours, Felix has mastered the majority of the games on offer. Assuming her inevitable defeat Irene stomps away from the consoles, shaking her hair back into place, growling to herself.
“Hey, I’m sorry I keep winning.” Felix chides, removing himself from the controllers.
“No your not.” She snaps back, stopping and bites her thumb.
“I was only joking.” Felix says, his heart dropping.
She breaths out and turns back to him.
“No, I’m sorry, I just get caught up in the competition”
“It was fierce,” He says.
“Yeah. You’re a quick study,” she says, eyes narrowing, “Unless you lied and have played these before.”
“You saying I was hustling you?” He smiles, still feeling the warmth of victory “Feeling bad for losing to a Noob?”
Irene narrows her eyes further, and it catches him off guard, maybe he was pushing it too far. She kept staring, waiting for an answer.
“No,” He admits, “I never got to play anything like this. As a… ‘Gifted child’ I was encouraged more towards academics than ‘time killers’” his gaze rests over the array of machines.
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Irene approaches him and puts a thin hand on his shoulder.
“I take it that’s not your term?”
“No,” He sighs, “my father’s.”
They continues to stare at the consoles.
“Shall we get another drink?” She asks.
“Yeah, sure.”
She fetches them another round, this time something sweeter and refreshing, and without the debilitating potion effect.
“A Mongolian pool.” She calls it.
Irene then leads Felix through yet another set of doors, up a large staircase with glittering floor work that is lit by low purple lamps.
At the crest, the hallway opens up into an open area above the club, a low glass ceiling frames the faint night sky, dark brown from all the pollution. To compensate, the glass had been laced with blinking LED’s to simulate the stars beyond the smog.
The music in here has a sedating vibe, smooth harmonies and easy groves melt his skin. His hand is taken by hers and she takes him to an unoccupied sofa, the shape of which, he notices, is the same as one of the blocks from the first game they had played.
They sit together. Irene tucks her feet under herself and faces him.
“Doesn’t sound like you had much fun as a kid.” She says, carrying on their conversation and taking a sip.
He looks down at his own drink, speaking to it.
“I didn’t have many… Friends, as you would say. But I made my own fun.” He looks up at her. “Not every 10 year old can build himself his own personnel computer from scrap, which by the way,” He holds up a finger, “had more processing capabilities than half the town put together.” He grins.
“And what does a ten year old do with such a machine?” Irene asks with a sly look on her face.
“Nothing too illegal,” He smirks, “I mean, I gave myself access to every network on the planet, but I didn’t do any harm with it, well maybe to one kid, but he deserved it.”
Her face is beaming, intrigued. “Go on.”
He sizes her up, “I’m not sure that I should.”
“Oh please,” She grabs his arm, squeezing it.
“Alright, alright.” He says before taking a drink and looking around the room, but no body is watching them.
There were not too many people in here, despite it’s size. There are a few loners, spaced out on earth knows what, staring up at the ceiling… Or licking the walls…
A few folk who’d stayed up past their bed time were asleep in one corner. Then there’s the seminal orgy in another corner, well not really, there were a few couples expressing themselves but not all together, the noise of them blended in with the music so he hadn’t really noticed them at first. At least one of the girls seemed to be having a great time.
“Come on, I wont tell anyone,” she presses.
“Bobby Brown, he bullied me. Head down the toilet, drone wedged fifty feet in the air above the play ground, accessed illicit sites with my login. You know, the usual childish stuff.”
“So…?”
“So I sent a virus into his home, had it set up shop on his computer, then everyone who he interacted with online would have complete access to his home network.”
He can’t help but smile at the memory.
“How did that go?” She asks.
“In about two days his house was raided by the government and him nor his family have ever been seen again.”
“Sweet Mother Earth.” She swears, eye’s widening.
“Not my proudest moment. And I’m sure he’s fine.”
Irene’s attention wanders, he’s losing her. Sucking at his bottom lip he scrambles for something to say.
“So what was your child hood like?”
“Oh,” She fumbles, “Nothing too special, never made anyone disappear or anything.”
“How were your parents?” He asks.
“They’re… Fine,” She says, “still married and enjoying their retirement together in Eden.”
“Lucky them.” He says, but a feeling nagged to be heard, why is she lying?
“Yeah, to be with real nature and not this synthetic nonsense.” She points her glass at the various artificial plant like decorations.
“What about yours?” Irene asks as she leans more on the head of the couch, getting comfortable.
He takes another drink.
“Both are gone now.”
“Oh, Felix I’m sorry.” She puts her hand on his arm again, holding it. The contact encourages him.
“I lived with them all through school, university, and even in my first jobs. They weren’t good with technology and the house wasn’t the best but it was home and I did what I could to keep it working.”
Felix’s eyes fall into hers, he swallows.
“There was a solar storm, the repairs I’d done weren’t enough, house was ripped apart in seconds.”
“But you survived?” Irene asks.
“I’d moved into the garage by that point, and ironically to protect them I’d reinforced it like a shelter so if anything I was working on went wrong, at least they wouldn’t be hurt.”
“You were in there when it hit?”
He nods.
“I didn’t even know anything had happened until the intercom buzzed. It was one of the neighbors.”
He takes another drink, leaning forward.
“Dad was dead, completely lifeless… Mum barely survived. She was badly injured, her lower spine ruined, permanently bed ridden. To pay for it all I worked hard, developed all those glorified toys and sold them, becoming the lead scientist for a group of immoral pigs.”
He knocks back the rest of his drink.
“Then she took a turn for the worse, I went to them, asking for money… They agreed. We signed a few papers, and I was rich… A little too rich. When I eventually checked with a lawyer, I found that they’d bought me out, all shares, the rights to my work, everything. And one of the papers was an NDA.”
He goes to take another drink but his glass is empty, so he motions to the nude barkeep for another.
“Mother died that the same day, told me just before to use the money, to save the planet instead.”
Felix looks back down at her, her head only inches from his now. His eyes dart down to her soft lips. He catches her looking at his, then she speaks.
“You know, back in Mrs Balinski’s poetry class, I had a bit of a crush on you, though I was too young and much too infatuated to ever approach you, but I loved listening to your poems, you had such a passion for it.”
“I did, it’s been a while.” He says.
“I’d love to hear them again.” She says, looking up at him, their faces are so close.
“I really wish we didn’t have to keep this professional.” She whispers, interrupting the moment hanging between them.
“Do we though?” He asks, moving closer, “It’s not like there’s a lot of time left in the world.”
“No” She says pulling back, “I can’t, I’m married for one, but… We’re going to have to say goodbye, one way or another, I don’t want to leave with a broken heart.”
“Yeah… yeah…” He also moves back. He was going to have to say goodbye to her, and he’d only just gotten to know her.
“What was it, you were trying to say, back in the club, before we danced?” Irene asks, changing the subject before he could question that first point she’d made.
He thinks back.
“That first drink, it felt similar to when I traveled through time, and I tried to ask, if you could travel to any time in history, without any repercussions, where would you go?”
Irene nods as she thinks. “There are so many, to see how the pyramids were really built, see our earliest ancestors on the plains of Africa, to see nature in it’s original form… Can you imagine seeing the Amazon Rainforest before the industrialization era?” she trails off. “What about you?”
“I think I’d like to go visit Einstein, or Tesla.” He muses.
“That makes a kind of sense.” She says, “A question I’d like to ask you: Lets say that when you die, you get the choice to go back and relive one full day of your life, what day would you choose?”
“I’m not sure if I should say,” He admits, “what’s yours?”
“My last day at university,” She stares off around the room, “There are so many friends I never got to see again after that day, I want to go back and hug them all one last time.” She looks back at him. “Go on, you can tell me.”
“I can’t, got to keep it professional, or I could just lie.”
“No that wouldn’t be the same.” She sulks.
She plays with the stirrer in her drink, knocking the ice around, before breaking the silence.
“I’ve been telling myself to keep it professional for so long…” She wipes a tear from her eye. “It’s just an excuse I’ve always used, so that I could stay focused on my work. But I ended up shutting everyone out. I lied, I’m sorry.”
“Hey, it’s OK.” Felix soothes as he puts an arm around her.
“No it’s not, my parents aren’t OK, they died when I was little, I just tell people that to sound normal.”
“Irene,” He whispers into her hair, “You don’t need to lie to me, I try to be as honest as I can, you can be honest with me, I wont judge you.”
Her hand wraps around his and grips it.
“I’m sorry… it’s worse than we’re allowed to let people know… We wont make it to the end of the year before the planet becomes completely uninhabitable, even the best environment controlled cities wont stand a chance.”
Felix sits for a moment, brain processing, this was not what he’d been expecting her to say.
“So the four years… is just a lie? Why?” He says, finally getting his mouth back in gear.
“To give them time to launch their own glorified salvation projects before the whole world goes to hell.” Irene tears up as she speaks, voice cracking.
“What about the Arcs? Will there be enough time to complete them?”
“They should be ready within two months.” She says.
“And if they’re not?” He asks.
“I don’t know.” She whispers, staring at the floor.
“We can stop it.” Felix says, his heart thumping, and he squeezes her hand tighter. “We can keep this world going.”
“I hope so, I really do, but… I have to leave in two months.”
Felix looks down into her hair. His arm still wrapped around her as she presses into his chest. Felix wishes they could be frozen in this moment forever.
“What’s between us, we can’t deny it, and when you go, it will be hard either way.” Felix can feel his whole body tense as he speaks. “I don’t want you to have memories of awkward tension between us, and questions like ‘what if?’ hanging over you.”
Irene sits up and rests her head in his arm, looking up at him, but says nothing.
“How about we make some nice memories,” Felix whispers. “it’s the least I can do for you.”
Their heads move closer together.
Their lips touch.
The whole building rocks. An explosion somewhere else in town. The world around them shuts down as the music stops and a siren sounds. Screaming fills the night air.
“Seriously! Come on,” Felix shouts, grabbing her hand and pulling her up, leading her back towards the stairs.
Another blast and the sky above lights up, the glass roof explodes and shards rain down behind them. The lights flicker and the walls around the staircase collapse in on themselves. He pulls Irene back and snaps his helmet into place. She follows suit and grabs his hand as they take off together through the ruined ceiling, into the glowing red night.
Bellow them several fires rage, but response units are already in motion. Felix looks back at the sky and sees the trailing signs of a solar flare racing off into the distance.
“You think they’d have given us a little warning?” Felix says, looking at her. They were still holding hands. “Are you OK?” He asks.
“Never better,” Irene replies, “I don’t usually drink and fly.” She jokes.
“Well just hold onto me, I do it all the time.”
“Yeah, I’ve noticed.”
“Now that’s unfair.”
“Lets just get home hero, we got work to do.” She mocks.
“That’s not what’s on my mind.” He retorts.
After a few minutes she asks another question.
“Since we’re past keeping it professional, tell me, what night would you relive?”
He looks at her.
“Tonight.”
He can’t see her face through the helmet, but her head moves about, as if she is thinking something over.
“I didn’t want to say earlier… Didn’t want to ruin this.” Irene says with a quiet voice.
“What is it?” Felix asks, nerves tensing in his stomach.
“Bart wouldn’t give up anything, unless I let him have access to the suits… There’s a group coming in a few days for a demonstration.”
“A… Demonstration…” Felix’s hand slips from hers, he’d forgotten she’d even told him, and now Bart wanted a fucking demonstration. “No. They’re not ready.”
Irene reaches out and grabs his hand.
“We’ll find a way.” Irene says. “I’m sorry.”
He wants to say a thousand different things to her, to berate her for letting the suits slip. But did it even matter… There time together was now a lot shorter than he had anticipated.
“It’s not your fault.” Felix hears himself say as he grips her hand tighter. “We’ll figure something out. We have to.”