23 - TYSE

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

T he climb back up to the tenth floor goes far slower than it did going down. But I've had enough stair-climbing to last me a month, so I don't mind the slow pace. Clara seems exhausted too. And by the time we actually get back to my place, she's very out of breath.

"Have a seat and I'll find you something to wear."

She collapses into my chair, then slumps back, frowning at me. "You keep spare sets of women's clothes around, do you?"

"No." I chuckle, checking my inventory of tactical pants. I find an old pair that don't fit anymore, and throw them at her. "They're gonna be too big, of course. But they'll do." Then I get a t-shirt and throw that as well. "You can take a shower if you want. The water will not be hot. It'll be just warm enough to make you feel worse when you get out than when you went in."

"An attractive offer."

When I look over at her I find her staring down at the clothes on her lap, frowning. "Sorry. It's the best I can do. I can take you shopping if you want."

"With what coin? I don't have any. And not to be disparaging, but you don't look like you have much either." Her eyes dart to my small jar of coins that I keep around to pay Anneeta.

"Well, I was thinking we'd check the big lost and found on the ground level, not actual shopping." This makes her laugh. "But ya can't leave anything of real value in the rooms here. People know better than to fuck with my shit, but it occasionally happens that something in here goes missing. Despite the drama last night with the door locking, the doors don't lock in the tower. I'm in the system, though. I've got a pension from Sweep and a digital wallet with the city. That's where I keep my coin. So if you want to look the part of up-city Birch, I'll buy ya something else. But we'd have to go into the Canal District for that."

Her face crinkles up. "Down those stairs again? Then all the way over to the Canal District, then shopping, then back up? No, thanks. I'll make do with these."

"All right. I'm gonna step out while you do that. I'll call Stayn and get a grocery order in."

"You're going all the way back down?"

"No. There's a service hub on Eight. It's got food and some other essential shit. Plus runners who are more than happy to go into the city for the right price. So I won't take long. Then after that…" I shrug. "I dunno. We'll figure something out."

She doesn't agree or disagree. Just sits there, staring off into space.

I leave and head to the stairs, wondering the whole way down what I'm actually doing. Did I just attach myself to this woman? Am I gonna be stuck with her for days trying to figure out what the hell is wrong with her? I didn't see any bruising on her face. There are no obvious injuries to her head that I could tell and no blood in her hair to indicate that someone hit her. But something is definitely wrong with her mind.

I know more than most about how this world works because the Omega Outlands don't exactly obey the same laws of nature as the places outside the Outlands do. But that's different. In just about every way possible.

Her story doesn't even make sense. I didn't find her on the other side of a door. She was in an ancient server room. The party theory is the only thing that adds up. She was drugged. She was down there too long and the spark messed with her mind.

It's the simplest solution, so that has to be it.

The service hub is on the opposite side of the tower from the main stairwell, so I turn right when I get to Eight and follow the curving hallway around to the opposing side of the building.

All floors with a service hub are crowded, and Eight is no different. There are no spare rooms here and so many people sharing them, they spill out into the hallway at times. Everyone wants to be near the action and the action up here is the pharmacals.

Drugs. They're everywhere, of course. But Eight is the only place in all of Tau City where you can get hits of spark. Everyone inside the tower—inside the ruins, actually—we all get a baseline level of spark. It never stops, but it never really changes either. A few volts from the mean, plus or minus, is normal. But that's it. You get what you get.

And eventually, this causes cravings.

So—free enterprise and all that—clever tower people have come up with a way to store the spark. Little batteries that you stick under your tongue to give yourself a jolt.

Or big ones that can deliver a jump directly to your heart—if you've got the coin for that. But that's a rare thing in the tower because no one in here does.

The pharms, jolts, and jumps are only sold on Eight. It's also the only floor that has a dumbwaiter system set up to deliver goods while you wait, without having to hire yourself a private tower runner.

Everything on Eight costs a fuckin' fortune. But everyone pays if they've got the coin because it's convenient.

I've never done a jolt, let alone a jump, so I don't do any business with that crew. I only deal with Rodge, who runs the basic commissary and makes his living off the store and the services he provides tower residents who have plenty of coin to waste. Like me.

There's a thick crowd in front of the door to Rodge's store—which is just three rooms that have had the walls knocked down to make space for inventory. He's the one with the dumbwaiter, a simple rope and pulley system with baskets going up and down nine to five. Down in the ruin Rodge owns another store with his own team of private runners who will go into the city and get you anything you want. For a price, of course.

I need a phone and some food. Normally I'd just get the prepackaged shit that's always in stock up here and call it good. But if I have to send down for a phone—and I do because Rodge can't stock those, the batteries get drained by the tower before they can get sold—then I might as well stock the pantry so I don't have to drag this woman all up and down the stairs every time her stomach rumbles.

There's a long line of people—there's always a long line of people—but as soon as Rodge sees me come in, he waves. "Tyse, friend. How can I help you?" He calls this out from the back corner. Then he stands up and waves me over to his desk.

I'm one of the few people inside the tower who pays with Tau City digital money, which is a lot easier to exchange and use outside the ruins than all those bulky coins everyone else pays with, so he treats me special.

I enter the cordoned-off space he calls an office and take a seat in the chair he's waving at. He sits too, shoots me a wide smile that makes his dark eyes brighten, and steeples his fingers under his chin. "What do you need, Tyse?"

"A phone and some good food."

"Yes, right away. What kind of food?"

"Non-perishable. And enough of it to last a few days."

Rodge is nodding his head as he speaks, always amicable. "Do you want rations?"

"Not really. What other choices you got?"

His eyes kinda sparkle now. "Are you entertaining someone?"

"I've got a…" I sigh. Because I don't know what to call her. "A guest. Temporary."

"Female?" He's smirking at me now.

"Yes. Not that it matters."

"You're entertaining a female. Well, then you need a proper grocery run."

"Well, I don't wanna cook anything."

"Will she not cook for you? Since you are housing her?" Rodge is a traditional guy, originally from Thetaiota, where the gender roles are pretty specific. He doesn't even live in the tower. His place is right outside the ruins on the canal. So he's got city power, which means he's got a kitchen. Which of course he does, because women, where he comes from, cook three times a day like clockwork. It's fucking crazy.

"I don't even know if she can cook, to be honest. But I'm pretty sure that's a no from the looks of her."

He squints his eyes at me. "She's one of those , huh?"

"Maybe. I dunno. I don't want anything we need to cook."

"Rations are your only choice then, friend. But there's a new brand out. Made for city adventurers." He pans a hand through the air in a dramatic arc as he says these last two words. Like he's selling me on the romantic idea of luxury camping. "How about those?"

"Fine. I'll take those. Plus a phone."

"No problem. I'll take care of it. It will be delivered within the hour."

I wait as he fills out a debit note and slides it across the desk. I sign it, and push it back. "See ya later." I stand up and turn to leave, but then I stop. "Hey. Have you seen Anneeta today?"

Rodge shakes his head. "No. She hasn't been up here at all."

"All right. If you do see her, tell her I'm looking for her."

"Will do."

I leave the store and hit the stairs. I want to find Anneeta just to see if she's got anything to say about last night, but I'm not walking all the way down to the ground for that. Not after I just paid a premium for my order. So I go back up to ten.

When I open the door to my quarters, I find Clara sitting on the bed, slipping on her shoes. Which I just now notice are more like fancy slippers.

She stands up as I take a good look at her. That long blonde hair of hers is wet and tangled, the t-shirt hangs off her like a flour sack, and the pants are so long, they're bunched up at her ankles.

When I meet her gaze, she sighs and appears uncomfortable, self-consciously looking down at herself, then back up at me.

"Looks good," I lie.

She smiles. "I look ridiculous. But I feel much better. So thank you."

"Well, those are some very nice manners you have there, Miss Birch." I pause here, wondering… "Is it ‘miss?'" Which gets me thinking about what Rodge said. Her being one of those . Meaning one of those modern women who don't think being a wife is a job.

I have maybe spent thirty seconds of my whole life wondering about the gender roles of women, so my curiosity kinda surprises me.

"It is ‘miss.' But I was engaged before all this tower stuff happened. Well, practically. We had three more months before my duty was up."

Some of her ramblings last night come back to me now. "Duty. As a Maiden."

She nods. "That's right. I was Maiden number nine."

I walk over to the chair by the window and sit. The shutters are still open, so there is a spray of unfamiliar golden light shining through the metal louvers, giving the place a cozier feeling than it normally has.

She reaches back, gathers her wet hair into a ponytail, then ties it into a knot on top of her head. After that, there's nothing but silence between us.

It gets awkward quick.

"You don't believe me?"

My shoulders shrug up. "You claim to come from another time. Or… another land. And you were sent here as a sacrifice to a god that doesn't live in this tower. Hasn't lived in this tower for hundreds of years. So… your story makes no sense, Clara. What am I supposed to think?"

She stares at me for a few seconds, her face very serious. "I understand. But your story doesn't make sense to me, either. I wasn't at a party. I mean, I was, but…" Her brows knit together and she sighs, then sits down on the edge of the bed and falls back, looking up at the ceiling for a moment before trying again. "I was at a party, but it was in my own Tau City. The ruins out there were towers. One on either side of the god's tower. It was an Extraction party. I was the Maiden being Extracted. My boyfriend"—she turns her head a little to look at me—"is in charge of the Extraction."

"What's that mean, exactly? He is the one who sent you through the door?"

She nods, but doesn't say anything.

"Well, he's a keeper, isn't he?"

I catch her smiling. "I was very pissed off when I walked through that door."

"I can imagine."

"He insisted that there was nothing he could do because if the Maidens are not sent into the tower after the bells ring, the god will compel all the ones in waiting too. And the Little Sisters. And ‘are you that kind of person, Clara?'" Her voice changes here. Like she's imitating her man. But she doesn't answer herself.

"Well? Were ya?"

She turns on her side, propping her head up with her elbow. "What do you think? I'm here, aren't I?"

"Yeah. Well, he could've just picked you up and tossed you through."

Her eyes dart down, like she's checking me out, then quickly flick up to meet my gaze. "Is that what you would've done? If you were Extraction Master?"

"If I had the power to kill people or save them…" But I don't finish. I just sigh.

"Well. Your uncertainty has been noted."

"It's kind of a tough decision. Kill one to save more? Or save the only one you love?" I'm not looking at her when I say this. "I guess we know where your man stands."

I expect her to object. Make up some kind of excuse. But she doesn't. She blows out a breath, flops back on the bed, and stares up at the ceiling. "That's what I said too."

"What? That he doesn't love you? It's probably for the best. People in love do crazy shit to keep that love. In my experience, anyway."

"You were in love once and did something crazy?"

"Me? No ." I kinda laugh. "I'm not into it. But I've seen lots of men do very stupid things for love. All you gotta do is watch the fuckin' screens. They've got those true crime shows running all the time. There's a bar I go to"—I nod my head behind me—"down there, just past the ruins, and they play that true-crime shit on the screens all day and night. It's a terrible idea if you ask me. They should just put a game on like every other fuckin' bar in town."

"A screen is…?"

I sigh. Because this has to be an act and I feel like I'm getting played. "A TV, a screen, a television."

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"You've never seen a screen? Your man never took you to the movies and got you popcorn and candy, then kissed you in the dark?" I'm joking, but not really. I am expecting an answer.

"What's popcorn?"

"Really?" I cock an eyebrow at her. "That's your answer? What's popcorn?"

"I've never heard of it, I'm sorry."

"You've never eaten corn?"

"No."

My laugh comes out as a huff. "You're winding me up, now. It's corn . It's in everything. It's fuckin' poison, if you ask me. But still, it's in everything. Every city grows corn."

She sighs, like she's tired of this conversation. Or maybe I'm boring her. "I don't know what to tell you, Tyse. Maybe we have a different name for it, and I would recognize it if I saw it. But I have never heard of corn."

She's not lying. If she is, she's psychopathically good at it. She has either truly never seen or eaten corn or her memory is just fucked. Those are the only two explanations.

Either way, this is bad.

"So, Clara. What do you want to do?"

"I haven't a clue. I don't think I'm going home, though."

"You mentioned friends? Other… Maidens?"

"Yeah. Haryet. But if she were here, wouldn't she have made a disturbance as well? And if that was the case, she would've been in that room with me. Or you'd have been sent to find her instead of me. And you didn't find her. So she's not here."

"Could she, perhaps, be in another room down there?"

"Wouldn't that have triggered an alarm?"

"Should've. But who knows? I sure wouldn't. That's the first time I've ever been down below the ground floor. I got a call from my friend, Stayn, asking me to check it out. It's possible that Haryet is the one who triggered the alarm, woke up, wandered away, and then you showed up after she was gone."

Clara sits up again, her face bright with hope. "Do you really think so?"

"No."

She smiles. Then chuckles. "Then why did you even say that?"

"Because it's possible. I just don't think it happened. But I don't think you're from some other version of Tau City, either."

She stares me straight in the eyes. "You think I'm lying."

"No. I actually don't. I think… you got hurt somehow and it's affected your memory. I think you need to go to the health center and get checked out. I think you should let me take you there."

She deflates and bows her head, looking down at her fidgeting hands in her lap. Then she sighs and gives in. "OK."

I nod. "OK. The phone and food should be here soon. Then we'll go down." She doesn't say anything or look up. "If you're too tired to walk back up tonight, I'll piggyback ya."

This makes her scoff. "I don't think that'll be an issue." Then, slowly, she raises her eyes to meet mine. "I'm not coming back up here."

"Why not?"

She just exhales again—this one sounding even more tired and defeated than the last—and then crawls up the bed, turning her back to me.

She doesn't say anything else and about ten minutes later, I know why. She's sleeping.

I think about what she said, about not coming back up here. She's probably right. She's not gonna have to worry about that ten-story hike up the stairwell because in all likelihood, I'm gonna take her to the health center, hand her over to the Tau City doctors, and they are going to label her as mentally ill.

They'll keep her there and then I'll walk out and never think about her again.

I sit in my chair silently watching her sleep until the delivery arrives. Then I unpack the rations and shoot a text off to Stayn. I give him the story I promised her I would. A vagrant, it's taken care of, nice doin' business with you. By this time, it's early afternoon and I don't see much point in putting off the inevitable.

I pocket the phone and approach the bed, then shake her shoulder a little. "You ready?"

It takes her a moment to open her eyes, then another to remember where she is and what's going on, but finally her gaze finds mine and she sits up, blowing out a breath. "Sure. Let's go."

We leave and descend the tower slowly. Everything about her is a little bit slow right now, her dash down the stairs this morning something akin to a long-forgotten memory.

The stairwell is crowded, as usual, and the lobby is even more of a madhouse than it was yesterday because the ID people are back. They have a whole bunch of tables set up this time and all of them have a massive crowd waiting in line.

We push our way through and go outside. She's walking ahead of me at this point, but she's unsure where to go, so she stops, looking up at me for guidance.

"This way." I point to the stairs that lead down to the east side of the city. "All the government buildings are over on this side of the canal."

She falls in next to me without comment, her mood dispirited. But she does start looking around at the buildings in front of us as we get closer to the edge of the ruin.

I would not say I like it here. I mean, I don't care about Tau City. I've got no loyalty to it. But as a Level One Metropolitan Area it's pretty fucking spectacular. I haven't been to all the great cities, but I've been to a lot of them. And this one right here is definitely in the top three that people should probably visit at least once in their lifetime.

If they can afford the travel, that is. Which most people can't.

But we went all over the world when I was in the Sweep. Especially that year before I was officially accepted into full-duty status. That was the year my augments were outperforming all expectations and I was at the top of my class. I was going places.

The Omega Outlands, as it turned out. Which sounds like a shit deal if you're not aware of what's actually out there. But for anyone in the Sweep, the Omega Outlands was the crowning jewel as far as deployment goes.

When Clara and I get to the very edge of the ruin, right at the boundary of all the new skyscrapers, she stops and just stares at it with her mouth open in shock as she tries to see everything at once.

It's one thing to see it from a distance of ten floors up and five hundred yards back and quite another to be standing at the base, looking up at these towering examples of architectural genius.

Again, I get the feeling that she's not lying. This is not a show she's putting on. This really is her very first time seeing such a magnificent city up close. And it's confusing for me. Because if her story isn't true, then what could explain her jaw-dropped awe?

I don't even prod her along. I don't tell her to stop gaping like a tourist or anything like that. I just let her look so I can watch her reaction.

It's real. She is genuinely surprised at what she is seeing.

"Do you like it?" I ask.

A breath comes out of her, like she was holding it in. Then she nods and smiles. "I have to admit, it's… something else."

"Good? Or bad?"

Her shoulders shrug up, practically to her ears. "Both? I'm not sure. My Tau City was much smaller." She points to the water. "The canal was… natural. There were beaches on both sides with boulders and little waterfalls spilling over them."

I look at the canal and picture this as she continues.

"And the bridges. They were not made of that hard-edged stuff."

"Hard-edged stuff? You mean concrete?" I laugh these words out. Because how does she not know the word for concrete? It's ridiculous.

"Yeah, OK. That." But she's moved on from the bridges and is pointing at the buildings now. "Are these made of glass?"

"Some of 'em. Some of 'em are made of steel. It's just shiny, so it looks like glass when the sun hits it a certain way."

"Well, our towers were tall too. But not this tall. And they were just made of plaster and stone, I think." She looks up at me. "I don't know how to make buildings. They just didn't look like that ." She points to the skyscrapers. "They looked… natural. Like the canal. Like they fit in with it. All of my city was covered in muted shades of beige and blue. And most of the towers had domes. Sun-bleached blue domes. Almost gray, some of them, because they were so old."

I picture her city, trying to overlay it across this one. There are a lot of traditional cities still out there, Zeta and Rho being two of the most famous. Both of those still have gods, of course. And no train system so hardly anyone ever goes there. I've never gone there. The image I have in my head comes from a textbook.

But Clara's Tau City would be much the same, probably. If it had a god the way she says it does. Because gods don't like change and gods don't like progress. Gods like tradition. Gods like to control the power distribution. Both kinds—the political power and the actual energy grid. Transportation too. Both Zeta and Rho are walking cities. No cars, no bikes, even. Maybe they have horses, but who knows? So this is my next question for her. Just to see what she says. "Did you have a train system?"

Clara reluctantly pulls her gaze away from the skyscrapers and looks up at me. "What?"

"Did you have trains in your Tau City?"

She laughs and looks back at the buildings. " No . We had ruins of trains. And tunnels, mostly caved in though. All that was outside the wall." She waves a hand in the air like whatever I'm going on about isn't important to her.

"You had a wall?"

"Yes. It went around the entire city, even the farms."

"What was beyond the wall?"

"Sand dunes. Mountains. Nothing."

Tau City, where we are, has sand dunes and mountains outside the metropolitan area as well. But the metro area is so fucking big these days that if you stand on the viewing platform of the highest, southernmost skyscraper, you can actually see Upsilon City through the public telescopes. So I test this detail out as well. "How far away was your closest city?"

"Closest city ?" She makes a face at me. "There are no other cities. Tau City is the last one standing after the Great Sweep."

"Huh." A twist in the mystery. But it's not helping her far-fetched story in the least. "So you're from the future?"

"No." She glares at me. "I never said that. I never said anything like that, so don't paint me as crazy. I'm just telling you how it was."

"The simple fact remains, Clara, that your reality and this reality don't match up."

She shrugs. "I don't care. I know what I know. And what I know is that I don't come from here. I walked through the God's Tower door and this is just the place I ended up."

"You're not even willing to consider that you might be ill?"

"I'm not ill."

"So that's a no."

She stops walking and turns to face me. "I never asked for your help."

"No. But you need it."

"Says who?"

"Do you know how to get to the health center? Because if so, by all means, up-city Clara Birch "—I bow and mockingly wave a hand at her—"have a nice day."

"It's not funny when you actually mean it, ya know."

I straighten up from my bow. "I'm not trying to be funny. You're mentally ill. I hope you get the help you need." Then I give her a little salute, turn, and start walking back the way we came.

"What if I prove it to you?"

I stop, shaking my head, telling myself to just keep walking. Because this woman, she's a really bad idea. I can feel it. But something compels me to hear her out. So I turn back. "How?"

She thinks for a moment, having not thought this through, I guess. But then she closes the space between us and looks up at me. "I'll go to the health center and let them check me out. Neither of us will say anything about my story. We'll just say I had a fall in the tower, hit my head, lost consciousness, and now I have no memory. None. And let's see what they say. Let's see if I do have a brain injury."

"I think you should just tell them the truth."

"What truth? That I think I'm in the wrong world? No. That stacks the deck in favor of your theory. My story isn't important. If I have a brain injury, they'll find it. And if they do, I'll concede that you're right and I'll get treatment. But if there is no brain injury—no signs at all—then you will accept my story as truth."

"Maybe you're just a liar?"

"Do you think that's all this is? A woman lying to you? To what end? I didn't come looking for you, you came looking for me. What could I possibly need from you that would justify this lie?"

She's got a point. There is no reason for her to be lying. I already came to this conclusion, I just feel like arguing with her for some reason. "Why do you care if I accept your story as truth? You're no one to me and I'm no one to you."

Her eyelids drop into a low and lazy position. Like these words just revealed something about me. Something she doesn't care for. And then there is a marked shift in her attitude. A polite smile appears. A hand extends as her back straightens. "Thank you for your help, then. I can take it from here."

It's in this moment that I see the real up-city Clara Birch for the first time.

I don't know who she is. Hell, maybe she doesn't even know who she is. But she is most certainly someone . She's got a certain poise to her now that wasn't apparent before I pissed her off with a dismissal. And she's not one of those women who will throw a tantrum or start screaming obscenities—though I have no doubt she's capable of that, given her colorful vocabulary.

She's in possession of herself. Completely in control. And this change is some kind of ingrained training. Something learned . Something cultivated. Probably over a long period of time.

I don't shake her hand, but neither does she walk away. We just stare at each other.

There's something going on here.

Some kind of pull between us.

I don't understand it, but it's definitely there.

"Admit you need my help."

She nearly guffaws. "What?"

"Admit you need my help and if you do, I'll agree to this little experiment. And if you aren't injured, I'll help you. Because that's what you want from me. You want my help. You're just too…" I pause, so I can choose the right word.

She squints, ready to be offended.

There are many words to describe my first impression of Clara Birch. ‘Egotistical,' ‘conceited,' ‘stuck up.' But these are actually just insults that I feel compelled to hurl at her because she's fucking with my preconceived expectations.

Better words to describe her are ‘composed' and ‘confident.' "You're just too proud to ask for it." ‘Proud' is the right way forward because there's nothing wrong with being self-reliant, which is the manner in which I mean it.

Clara's expression softens, but she tilts her chin up at the same time, perfectly illustrating my description. "You'll help me get home?"

"If you come out of the health center pronounced perfectly fit, I'll help you. I don't know what that means, but I'll help you."

"Why?" She's squinting at me. "I mean, what's in it for you? You literally just said, like thirty seconds ago, that I'm no one to you."

"You are no one. That's not a lie. But… I'm curious."

"About?"

"Your story, for one. But also… you. Because nothing adds up."

"That doesn't answer my question. Who cares if nothing adds up?"

"I just feel a compulsion of curiosity."

"That's it?" She side-eyes me. "You're not even gonna mention that I'm pretty?"

"What?" And then I smile.

"I mean, that would make more sense."

"What would make more sense?"

"That you want sex."

"That's not it."

"I'm just saying, if it were , it would make sense. But you're sticking with ‘curious,' huh?"

I force the grin down. Make myself serious. "Yes. I'm sticking with curious."

"Suit yourself. Which way to the health center then? I'm ready."