Her mum was sprawled on the floor, with her dad over her, rhythmically pressing his hands into her chest.
“Come on Isabelle, please…” He pleaded.
Grocery bags had been thrown by the entrance, and Kareem’s phone was by his side, a green icon of an outgoing call filling the screen. Farrah didn’t pay attention to any of it, as she rushed to her dad ushering him to the side, as she took over.
He fell back, resting against a wall, as he caught his breath. He tried to say something to Farrah, but the words never quite left his lips. He was almost 50, and the physical exertion of the CPR plus the stress of it all was not doing him any favours.
And either way, Farrah wouldn’t have heard him, over her own heartbeat that echoed in her chest and seemed to fight for room in her brain with the strident looping 3-second jingle of emergency services. Palm over hand, she pressed into her mother’s chest. Again and again. 30 times, then two blows of air into her lungs. 30 times –
“I got you some water ‘pa,” Hubert came out of the kitchen. He looked stressed and was trying his best to hide it. Farrah could only spare him a quick glance, and what she hoped passed as a reassuring smile before she pressed her mouth over Isabelle’s, with tears in her eyes.
“That’s good,” Kareem replied. Even those few words were stramineous for him to put together. “Put the … rest of the groceries away, the ambulance will be here any … minute.”
Farrah threw her jacket over the phone as Hubert passed by. He didn’t have to know that they hadn’t connected to an operator yet. And Farrah wished she hadn’t known that the call had been ongoing for over twenty-five minutes.
It made it harder for her to keep on pressing her hands over her mum’s heart, failing to reanimate it with each consequent push. It was as if her mum’s body was becoming harder and harder with each passing second, and the only thing still keeping it warm was Farrah’s own body heat, amplified by adrenaline and desperation, and transferred in small waves with each press.
When she pulled her chin back, freeing her mum’s airways for another insufflation, she felt her mum’s cross slip against her palm.
“Far,” ‘Pa’s voice came called out.
She glanced at him – a movement all too brusque. Her vision blurred, from the effort and from tears. They exchanged a look. He knew. He didn’t want to tell her, but he knew. He didn’t want to say it.
Farrah shook her head. She muttered a ‘no’, before returning her hands over her mother’s chest.
“I’m all done,” Hubby ran out of the kitchen. “Do you think – I can go outside so the doctors will know this is the right house? That way … that way they’d…”
He knew too. He was six, and he didn’t fully understand it, but he knew that his mummy was gone.
“Yes,” Kareem smiled, taking Hubert’s hand, “That’s a good idea. Perhaps your sister can-”
In 1: System Release Update
System_Online = sys.exec("TheSystem.ssy", [sys_ii for sys_ii in range(1, 555)], raise_alpha_error=True)
diagnostic_Check = dgsc_release_000(System_Online, D="OlegS/SystemFinal/all_runn.ssy", diagnostics_Check_=[jj for jj in all_pop[Quad + sys.fetch.location.gbl] if jj.isValid])
Out 1: 568 Errors Raised.
In 2: Patch
Update_Compiled = diagnostic_Check.copy().replace("for file", "for jj", "for subfile in D:OlegS/SystemFinal/OutVER/to_replace_rlz_ver_final_final.txt")
diagnostic_Check = dgsc_release_000(System_Online, D="OlegS/SystemFinal/all_runn.ssy", norm=True)
sys.import(dynamic_tasks[max(user_behavior["skill_usage"], key=user_behavior["skill_usage"].get, default="No_Combat")])
Out 2: 16 Errors Raised.
Run Domain.ssy? y/n
In 3: Default
sys.exec("Domain.ssy", localisation_upd_time=300, interval="std_day")
Domain_name = fetch.source("Domain.ssy").get("location.x_y_current")
Out 3: True
In 4: Tutorial Activation
try:
print("tutorial working")
TutT = sys.fetch.ppt(o='D:OlegS/SystemFinal/Alpha_NT/Tutorial_slides.ppt')
System_Tutorial = Display([slide for slide in TutT if out_cath], "sys_145.ssy")
except Exception as e:
pass
Out 4: Input Error: input in sys_145.ssy line 607 must be integer
In 5: HUD Update
hud_display = sys.activate("D:OlegS/SystemFinal/HUD_Main_Interface.sgd", ["stats", "skills", "goals", "other"], combat_overlay=False, HUDnotification=True)
quest_limit = {"User name": 5}
sys.notifs(display_errors=False, display_warning={"Domain": True, "Power_var": False, "Luck_var": False, "Goal_var": True, "Quest_limit": True})
try:
hud_custom = sys.updateNULL("D:OlegS/SystemFinal/HUD_Main_Interface.sgd", ["stats", "skills", "goals"], col="compiled_colors.pdf", font="fonts.ttf", arrange=True)
hud_custom2 = sys.updateNULL("D:OlegS/SystemFinal/HUD_Main_Interface.sgd", ["stats", "skills", "goals"], arrange=True)
hud_custom2 += hud_custom
hud_display.update(hud_custom2)
print("HUD Updated")
except:
pass
Out 5: Error. Redefinition of function in line 4533. Did you mean sys.combine(hud_custom2, hud_custom, merge_type="grt")
In 6: Difficulty Adjustment
try:
domain_factor = sys.fetch("domain", Domain_name).get("difficulty_factor", 1)
quest_count = len(user_behavior.get("goals_fulfilled.lst", []))
potential_growth = dynamic_task.get("potential_growth", 0.5)
if potential_growth >= 0.05 or len(user_behavior["goals_fulfilled.lst"]) > 500:
quest_count = sys.replace("D:OlegS/SystemFinal/all_vers_final_f2/goal_gen.ssy")
quest_count.reset()
except:
pass
Out 6:
Farrah tried her best to ignore the wall of code, that lingered a sorry amount of time in front of her eyes, as she continued doing chest compressions.
It was the sound of a glass falling onto the wooden floors that snapped her back to reality.
“Pa?” She turned around.
He had fallen to the floor, water spilling where he’d dropped the glass.
“Papa? Papa, what’s wrong?” Hubert had collapsed by him, as he vigorously shook him by the shoulders.
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It was the blue screen. It had –
Farrah couldn’t bring herself to finish that though. It couldn’t be right. Perhaps it was just stress. She crawled the short distance to her pa and gently pushed Hubby aside.
“Pa?” She asked again, pressing her hands into his shoulders just like they’d taught in first aid classes.
She tilted his head backwards, pushing under the chin.
He wasn’t breathing.
“Hubby, baby, did you see what I did to mummy?” Farrah asked as she began unbuttoning her pa’s shirt with shaky hands.
Her little brother nodded.
“Will papa wake up?” He asked, with tears in his eyes.
Farrah pressed her lips together in a sad imitation of a smile. It took her a second to collect herself enough to reply:
“I will try my best to make him wake up.”
The mess of mascara, sweat, and tears covering her cheeks took away what little credibility that statement might have had.
“But, mummy didn’t wake up. And the doctors…”
“The doctors are also trying their best,” Farrah dragged her dad a bit further down the hallway. She lost balance, failing to properly pick him up, and fell on her bum, before getting up and trying again. “Dial 909 on the big phone, and on my mobile. That way the doctors will have -” she had to catch her breath, “will have two more chances to hear us. Then,” She wrapped her left palm over her right hand, “Do as I do to mummy, okay?”
Hubby nodded and ran to the house phone by the door. He called out into the receiver a few times. Then, he yanked the cable out of the wall and ran past Farrah to plug it into the nearest kitchen socket. He dialled 909 again, left the phone receiver on the floor, and ran up to Farrah, taking her mobile phone out of her back pocket. It took him a few seconds to find the ‘emergency call’ button, and Farrah muttered some half-assed reassuring sentence.
Her mobile was dropped by her side, as a third ringtone joined to the cacophony in the hallway.
“Do as I do, bad hand over good hand, at the bottom of the ribs, where the big flat bone stops,” Farrah explained, trying to catch her breath in between words and chest compression. “Put all your weight. As hard as you can, so mummy’s heart would feel it.”
“Wouldn’t that hurt mummy?” Hubby asked, having seemingly forgotten that mummy could no longer be hurt.
“A little. But that’s okay, as long as she …” Farrah breathed into her pa’s lungs. Twice. “Yeah, as long as she breathes again…” She whispered.
Hubbert sniffled and started doing chest compressions. They weren’t nearly deep enough, nor fast enough, but that was okay. They weren’t there for Isabelle. And neither was what Farrah was doing now for Kareem. She knew it. But she refused to indulge in the thought. They couldn’t be gone. Not right now, not like this. Not randomly taken by some floating blue text.
Farrah cried out. A loud, ugly angry gutter sound, that turned into a sob.
“Keep going,” she whispered to Hubbert. “We must keep going.”
Hubby nodded, wiped his nose and eyes, and got back to it. To his little unsure chest compressions, all too shallow and slow.
----------------------------------------
They sat on the kitchen floor. The house phone receiver had long since been put down where it belonged, and both cell phones were turned off. The front door must have still been openeded because Farrah didn’t remember closing it.
Hubby was quietly sobbing into her chest. She had wrapped her arms around him, holding him close, praying that whatever the blue screens had done to her parents, they wouldn’t do to him.
The tiled floor was cold, and just enough light came from the dimming sun outside to illuminate hairs rising along her naked arms. Was it from the cold, or fear of what’d happened and what would happen next, she didn’t know.
“Come on Hubby,” she patted her brother on the head. “Let’s fill the canisters downstairs. You can pack your travel clothes, and we will go on a trip.”
“I already filled them,” Hubby sniffled. “Papa told me to.”
Farrah nodded. Of course, he would have. He had to keep his little boy busy…
“Do you want a toastie?” Farrah asked, gently moving her brother off her knees as she got up.
“Not hungry,” he shook his head. “Mummy and papa, are they with God?”
“Mhuum,” Farrah nodded, forcing a smile, as she knelt down again. “They’re in heaven with God, where they will wait for us until we can be all together again.”
“When?” Hubert asked. The tears were suddenly gone from his eyes. “I want to see them again- for real, not...” he glanced back to the coridor.
“I don’t know baby,” Farrah gently ran her hand through his hair. “Maybe in twenty years, maybe in eighty. But they’ll be waiting, and I’m sure they’ll tell you how brave and strong you’ve been today.”
“I wasn’t that strong… I didn’t make mummy’s heart alive again…” Hubby muttered.
“You tried. You tried your hardest. We both did,” Farrah smiled. “There’s nothing we could have done. These screens … they are the ones that,” she considered for a second whether or not she should say it, but decided that Hubby had grown up enough tonight to understand it. “The blue screens killed pa and mummy.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know, Hubby.”
“Will they kill me too?”
Farrah silently moved her lips into half-formed ‘no’s’ and excuses. Hubert spoke for her:
“Because I didn’t bring mummy back. The screen asked to save mummy, and we didn’t do it.”
Farrah’s eyes grew wide, as she grabbed her brother by the shoulders.
“What did you do? Hubert, what did you do?”
“I just – I just pressed ‘yes’,” his eyes were filled with tears. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to – I don’t know – I-”
“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Farrah brought him in close, into a hug. “You didn’t know, it’s a simple mistake. Can you, umm, can you try to read the letters in your task screen?” She made hers appear in front of her, to double-check before adding, “The ‘goals’ screen, sorry. It’s the third one down, on the left. If you think about it-”
“It’s here, can you read it for me? The words are too long.”
He waved a bit to the left. Farrah took a shaky deep breath, trying to hide her frustration with the situation from her brother.
“I can’t see it, baby,” she pulled away and glanced to where he was waving, just in case. “How many um, goals do you have?”
“Three,” Hubert weakly replied. “Is that bad?”
“No, no, that’s very good,” Farrah smiled. This meant that he didn’t have that 24-hour timer that she did, which also reminded her that she needed to deal with that sooner rather than later if she didn’t want to find out … She shook her head. She could make an educated guess as to what would happen if she still had 7 goals tomorrow morning. “Is the one about mummy still there?” She asked.
Hubert nodded.
“Are there any words you recognise in the other goals? Anything at all?”
Hubbert nodded again.
Farrah rubbed his back and gave him an encouraging nod.
“Kill a per-son,” he slowly read out.
“No,” Farrah whispered. “That can’t be… it can’t ask a child…” But why wouldn’t it? Whatever ‘it’ was, it’d just killed their parents. It gave Farrah an absurd list of tasks, promising her that she’d end up just like them if she didn’t do it, and threatening to do the same to Hubby if he –
“Give up.”
“What?”
Hubby’s voice snapped Farrah back to reality.
“That’s what the last square says. It’s like the ‘yes’ with mummy. I can press it-”
“No!” The plea didn’t finish leaving Farrah’s lungs when the light in Hubby’s eyes went out.
It was like a switch had gotten flipped. One second, he was there, and the next he wasn’t. She caught him before he collapsed to the ground. She put her hand under his shirt, over his bare back, unwilling to let go, unwilling to accept that his ribcage wasn’t pushing against her palm, and that his little heart was no longer beating.
“No,” She cried, holding him tighter. “Not you, please… Not …”
Had he thought that pressing that button would make it all go away? Did he anticipate his death? Did he do it to be with mum and pa? He was six, of course he didn’t. Farrah knew he wouldn’t have done it on purpose, nor to escape from the pain of losing so much in mere hours. He’d made a clumsy mistake... and that’s all it took for this monstrous System to take his life…
----------------------------------------
Farrah had remained crying, with her brother in her arms, on that freezing kitchen floor for a very long time. The streetlights never turned on, so she was shocked to see it was almost 11 PM when she returned to her senses.
She felt drained. Empty. Her arms hurt from over half an hour of CPR, and she’d pulled a leg muscle when she moved her pa in the hallway.
She forced herself to eat two slices of bread – which tried to come back up the second she finished chewing on them. She drank two glasses of water and caught herself thinking that this might be the last time she’d taste water from the tab.
Then, she tried to reassure herself that someone would come and fix this. The marines. The mainland military. Some accord would get signed somewhere, and in a few days, this would be nothing but a bad dream. The blue boxes would go away, she’d bury her family –
She didn’t have any tears left in her. She went upstairs, covered the staircase in duvets, went back down, locked the front door, buttoned up her mum’s shirt, and dragged her, slowly but surely to her and her pa’s bedroom.
Getting her on the bed proved to be more of a challenge, mostly because her arms and back hurt, and when several blue screens popped up to notify her that her endurance, pain threshold, and carrying capacity had increased, she began crying again.
She didn’t remember how she got her ‘pa upstairs. The hallways were too dark, and her vision was blurry.
For some reason, even though he was the easiest to carry, Hubby was the heaviest of the three.
They looked like they were sleeping; taking a nap after a long day of shopping in town. Farrah found the big Easter candles in their storage cupboard downstairs, and put them on either side of the bed, over small ceramic plates.
“Don’t worry mum, I’ll clean the wax,” Farrah whispered, as she lit them.
She watched them, from the doorway. They lay side by side, in the dimly lit room. There wasn’t space left on the bed for her, and she was okay with that. She whispered a prayer, made a cross sign with her fingers, and closed the door, letting them rest.
----------------------------------------
At around 3 AM Farrah broke down the door to her manager’s office. She poured a cup of water, which thankfully was still running, into his orchid, and checked her ‘Goals’ list again.
Stats
Skills
Goals
Other
Goals
· Kill a person
· Get the 3-cmb-up shot
· Walk 10 kilometres in a 24h span
· Get the kitchen faucet fixed
Give Up
For as despotic as the System was with whom it killed, it was very lax on rules around goals. She’d bought a worthless certificate for 200 quid online, and sent a text message to her nan, knowing full well she wouldn’t receive it. Now all that was left was to replace the plastic thing under the faucet, which Farrah had stolen one of at the same hardware store she’d acquired her crowbar. She didn’t want to break into a pharmacy to get a shot, and she wanted to administer it to herself even less, but it was that or cardiac arrest.
As she headed out of the little clothes shipping firm, where she wouldn’t ever clock in at 8:57 AM, or ‘borrow’ fabric scraps from, she talked herself into breaking into a pharmacy. All she needed was to find one where someone had broken the glass doors before her, just like with the hardware store.
She turned off her flashlight and hastily made her way back towards her neighbourhood. Above her, helicopters were flying, and police sirens could be heard from some of the bigger streets. A riot had broken out by the canal, but neither the police nor the angry people trying to get to the gun store paid Farrah any mind. She was far too preoccupied with her own tasks and grief to notice that, all in all, there were all too few people in the streets. Perhaps the looting and rioting had calmed down this late in the night. Perhaps there’d been some TV or radio announcement Farrah had missed.
Either way, she’d made it home just in time to pack, check on her neighbours and invite the two that were still alive with her, before setting out towards her and Anna’s rendezvous point.