Everything was black. Bec couldn’t move. She hurt. Very bad. She shouldn’t feel anything… unless… there is an afterlife. She died, and this was reality. The Timelet updated as she fell into range ensuring another Bec got the message, but her existence continued. Maybe all those previous Becs were trapped by death. Bec started to panic in her shell of darkness. Oh god, oh fuck, this is it, death is eternal darkness. Death will take us all into an eternity inside the void in agony.

“Bec, calm down. You’re not dead… unless there is an afterlife for A.I.”

Bec would sigh if the crushing black void didn’t prevent it. Al? Al?! Thank god you’re here. Unless we are stuck in the void together? It’s not so bad if you’re here. We’d probably get sick of being together forever. Maybe that’s the punishment? I have to atone for not thinking of you much lately. I’m so sorry.

“Bec, please shut up. You. Aren’t. Dead. I feel your vitals. I think you survived your fall somehow, however unlikely that is.”

Bec believed Al, but her heart couldn’t. It started beating like wild, a sense of dread welling up in her throat. This was when Bec heard a noise from the void. It was… knocking. She heard a muffled voice come in.

“Bec, don’t panic. We’re trying to get you out as we speak. You need to not ‘totally freak, bruh’ or you’ll run out of air.”

Bec was full of complex feelings. She wasn’t dead. She was fairly safe… but Robert just had to take a jab at her. She heard banging and smacking. Then the void cracked open! Bec fell out of a split shell of… foam? She was sat on the floor of the FAB room. The room was mostly empty, the bodies had been removed but the throne remained. She held up her hands towards the standing lights pointed at her.

“Erm, Bec? Did you just… shield your eyes?” Ms. Scarlet stood there, hale as ever. Only about 5 hairs were out of place. Bec felt the split ends with a certain clarity.

Bec murmured to herself, “No, the light was… I think I see. I think I’m seeing now.”

Robert pressed something to Bec’s head. “You’re not. Your eyes are trashed. Is it Focus?”

Bec laughed. “Naw, is yours maybe... Mechanic?”

Robert laughed. “Nope. Good guess though.”

Bec’s mind swam. Her wounds hurt so badly that she couldn’t think straight. Her mind bounced between thoughts like a glass bead bouncing on tile. “Is everyone okay? What happened to Tamara? Purple? How did I live?”

Robert was looking at a tablet with growing irritation as Bec spewed words forth unabated. “Yes. Dead. Fine. You know what? Bec, your wounds have started to close but your body is going wild. Those blades have started wreaking havoc on your organs. I’m going to ask you to shut up… this is going to hurt.” He tapped Bec’s forehead thing and the world went white with pain. Everything did hurt and Bec screamed. Her body was flat, and her muscles tried to seize against the pain of her body feeling like it was collapsing in on itself. Slowly, the pain faded like the spots in the eye after looking at the sun. The scintillating waves of pain sizzled and popped away. Motes of agony sparked and fizzled as Bec felt wounds worsen and then recede. Then the world slowed down and Bec was in a hospital bed. The machines to her side bleeped and crackled with energy. Bec soaked in the room. With an anguished groan, she realized where she was. She was in that damn cage again.

Bec gritted her teeth but realized one of those machines was certainly a Geiger counter. She flexed an imaginary muscle, and the machine started to crackle only a little. Bec heard a familiar person come down the hall and swing open the barred door.

“Robert… I—I don’t know what to say.” Bec didn’t want to waste time. The fact that she lacked a particular plan on where she wanted the conversation to go didn’t really dampen that feeling.

“Say thank you… then explain this to me…” He pulled out the Timelet. It had a little taped red X on it so Ms. Scarlet could easily differentiate Bec’s Timelet from Tamara’s otherwise nondescript black tablet.

Bec groaned. “I guess you were bound to start asking eventually.”

“I think it’s fair to ask how a kid as old as you managed to subvert every single security system I have, enslave half my people, and nearly destroy my life’s work?”

"You don’t have it backed up?”

“Not the point, Bec.”

Bec hugged a pillow. “Is she dead?”

“Yes.”

Bec wanted to believe it, but it wasn’t real unless she saw proof. “Can I see the body?”

“No.”

Bec gaped. “What? Why not?”

“When I appeared in the Traversal Room, I saw Tamara trying to beat on a safety foam egg. The moment I realized she was hostile, I shot her in the head, then and there. Ms. Scarlet plummeted out of the upper levels and landed in her own foam egg…”

Robert sized Bec up and saw she didn’t know what he was talking about. “We have safety measures for those that fall from upper platforms. It’s required to have a safety foam launcher eyeing each of the platforms and floors… Being Scarlet, she wasn’t slowed down at all and popped out to explain to me about Tamara’s enslaving of many of the Border men and women. We found the base in utter chaos. The people… they all knew Tamara had died. They attacked Scarlet and me on sight. We barely repelled their attacks until we found Purple and a few women barricaded in the cafeteria. We fought them back using the remaining… sane members. When we retook the FAB room, Tamara’s body was gone…”

Robert could tell Bec wasn’t satisfied. “She got quite an unhealthy dose of bullet, Bec. She’s dead. For sure. Everyone who was fully indoctrinated by Tamara went mad… they fled into the Suburbs with her body.”

Robert had a sour look. “Twenty-five men and four women, gone. They were good people. And Tamara warped them.” Robert mumbled about how he hated mental Words with a shake of his head.

“I’m sorry, Robert. Sorry that this had to happen.”

Robert held up the Timelet. “Explain. Now.”

Bec sighed. “It’s a device that records my actions. When I die, it sends it to the past, so I don’t make the same mistakes in the new timeline.”

Robert looked at the black tablet. “I couldn’t figure it out. Dad installed shielding to prevent me from prying…” He let out a sigh bigger than Bec’s was just a few moments ago. “Bec, let me show you something.” He pulled Bec to her feet. Strings affixed to her body lead to machinery that monitored her vitals.

Did they need to use wires just for me? Bec thought. The beeps and crackle followed her as she rolled the medical devices with her down the hall. Robert held one of Bec’s hand tight as he guided her to the FAB. It was completely clear now and people, mostly women, were shuffling around waving devices and reading off of tablets. Robert took her to an elevator off to one side and they started to rise. Bec pushed the button to the fifth floor.

“What are you doing?”

“Let me off here… please.” Robert did nothing to stop Bec as she rolled her clunky monitor over the crack between the floor and the lift. She limped just for a moment, the pain still tight on her ribs, before reclaiming a more collected gait. She walked familiar hallways, seen clear now than when she was fleeing for her life.

She turned to a catwalk. Robert tailed behind her, trying to figure out what the detour was all about. It was answered when he saw Bec walk up and drag her fingers over the air towards a discolored splotch of concrete out near the FAB. “Robert… I died here. I’m sure I did.”

“Bec, I again can’t stress how very much alive you are.”

“I should have died.”

Robert frowned hard. “You are far too young to have the Founder’s Pattern. Bec, you have your whole life ahead of you! There is far too much to do, to see! Surely there are things left for you to do before life’s fabric wears thin?”

“I mean it, Robert. I tried to kill myself.”

“From what I hear, that’s not the end of you.”

“You heard wrong.” Bec held her hand up towards Robert’s face. “It’s the end of the line for me. My existence—” Bec waved out into the open space below. “Everything about me would be splashed on the ground like a red-brown water balloon. Bec felt like a balloon ready to burst. “I’m not some test dummy for immortality… I’m a damned test dummy for mortality.”

Robert nodded but stayed silent.

Bec shook her head in frustration.

“I see the potential greatness in something like this. This could change everything…” Robert said flatly.

“You see greatness. It is great. It really is. It’s awesome.” Bec paused. “It’s awful, too.”

Robert nodded again and joined Bec on the railing. “Did Ms. Scarlet tell you why I don’t like the SensoLink they put in you?”

Bec shook her head again.

Robert sighed. “Scarlet doesn’t really know. She thinks she knows, but she doesn’t. I actually have one in me.” He rapped a finger to his head.

Bec didn’t say anything.

“Some people say that the world runs on contracts. We all agree to play by rules set by others in exchange for them to play by our rules. This is perfectly understandable, and many people live their lives content with this fact. They are right to do so. It seems perfectly fair to live life under contract.” Robert put out both his hands flat. “It’s a balance between freedom.” He clenched one hand. “And security.” He clenched the other.

Bec cocked her head. She wondered about the point of all this. “You’re saying we made a bad deal? A Faustian Bargain? No, we’re dealing with only each other here. Humans aren’t inherently malicious.” Bec said that knowing that it only came as a personal opinion and not from any informed certainty. No one could be certain of humanity. It was far, far too complicated.

“Did you agree to come to Dust?”

“Technically… I didn’t really know what I was signing up for.”

“You are a kid. You were preyed on.” Bec wrinkled her nose at that but Robert ignored that.

“Did the kids born here agree to be Dustites? No, they didn’t. Contracts are an inevitable part of life… but there are some contracts we are born into. Freedoms we will never taste.”

Bec gasped as understanding dawned on her. “You had the Link put in as a baby?”

Robert stared off and gave the smallest of nods. “Do you know what it’s like for your Dad to know who your crush is before you yourself knew? His damn algorithms, his damn quantifying of everything.” Robert clenched the railing. He was frighteningly quiet when he continued. “I snuck into my Dad’s office and cracked his password system when I was fifteen. I was going through a spirituality phase… I was rebellious, what can I say? So, I prayed endlessly to God that you couldn’t quantify me in numbers and charts and logs, but when I looked at his data on me, I saw everything. I looked at the sum total of me on that day and my prayers were answered by a line that said, ‘Weekly Religiosity Quotient: +3%.”

Bec winced. Did the SensoLink capture data that granular? That ephemeral? He’s had over a century to grapple with this, but he’s still so cut up about it. What could I say?

Al said, “Don’t say anything. Just listen. I found that to be highly effective. With you at least.”

Robert continued, “Do you know what is so damn disappointing about old sci-fi? They always tried to say that there was something immutable about the human soul. I dreamed and dreamed that there was something special about me. About who I am, how I think,” Robert sighed, “How I feel. I wished every day that I could surprise my Dad. That one day, my growth would be ‘off the charts,’ but I was always just ‘on schedule’ and now—?” Robert’s lips tightened and he shut his eyes.

“I’m sorry, Robert.”

“No… I’m sorry, Bec. You’re the one suffering and I just went off again.”

“I think… well, I don’t know what I think, but I’m ready for what you wanted me to see now.”

~~~

“It’s so amazing!” Bec and Robert stood at a lookout on top of the mountain base. Robert insisted that Bec not think about the energy logistics required to take the elevator up hundreds of floors only to exit around ninety stories up, but that was a mere afterthought in her mind compared to this scene.

“It’s your first time seeing the City, isn’t it?” Robert coughed.

Bec held her hands out to the wind and felt the horizon on her fingertips. Her feeling of wonder outshined even the cloud that had been hanging over her head since arriving on this damned planet. “It’s not just a city. It’s seven of them! Seven of those things!” What Bec felt was strange, to say the least. She almost doubted her senses. What she saw were the Suburbs, spreading out as far as the horizon, rising up and over a winding valley formed by odd smooth mountains and hills, hugging the contours of the undulating geology. It was a city planners’ dream.

The sprawl was endless, yet that all was in the shadow of something grander. Something insane. What she saw were multicolor towers looming over the city below. The Suburbs were a city in their own right but… this? The 6 perfect, geometric, shiny, crystalline shapes just floated there, tethered by a single massive chain for each like Dust wore them as a set of necklaces or earrings. Yellow, Grey… no wait, Gold, Silver, Bronze, Red, Green, Blue. They looked like they were being dragged towards the sky, points scraping the top of Bec’s ability to see. These things didn’t just touch the clouds, they appeared to disappear far beyond them. In the center of these six behemoth towers, there was a single black tower firmly planted to the ground. It was tiny in comparison, but Bec could tell it dwarfed any of the greatest buildings of Earth, possibly by a factor of 10 in width, and maybe twice the height. Her balance wavered for a moment as her whole body felt a pull towards it and she nearly bowled over the railing. The vertigo of teetering over a railing caused her to pull back, quickly bringing her senses back to the ground beneath her feet and the heart monitor warning her of the jolt to her heart delivered by the brief brush with gravity.

Robert smiled but it didn’t reach his eyes. “It is grand, isn’t it?”

Bec nodded vigorously, without breaking her attention away from the glimmering façades. “Why… is it like that?”

Robert cleared his throat and said, “It’s complicated. Know this. There is a saying on Dust, ‘Fate is not your own. It is something shared by all of us.’ This truest in the towers. Gold, Silver, Bronze, Ruby, Emerald, Sapphire. They represent the beauty of Dust. We, humans, take the dust under our feet and we create beauty from it. Strength of metal, the gleam of gems. They are all ours to control.”

Bec thought he was avoiding the question, so she pressed him, “Certainly this setup isn’t just extravagant visual flair? Could it?”

Robert nodded, solemnly. “You’re right, Bec. What you’re looking at is the cruelest game ever played on humanity. The towers promise everything you could ever want… and more. Anyone to live in the City,” Robert pointed at the black tower in the center, “will have all their needs met. They are free to pursue all their earthly desires. It’s… heaven, truly.”

“So, what could the Towers offer?”

“Things you wouldn’t understand yet. The towers offer people glory, power, conflict… and risk.”

“Risk… the towers are for people who are… bored?”

“In a way. People won’t admit that openly, but I guess you’re right, Bec, in a year, the Ruby tower,” Robert pointed at the radiant red tower, “will fall into space and everyone inside will die.”

Bec shuddered. “What do yo—”

Robert cut her off curtly. “Bec, The core, the governance of the City, it values productivity most of all. Innovation. Do you know what it decided? It said, and I quote, ‘the immortality of humankind has become a hindrance to the future success of Dust as a colony. Please do better at killing yourselves.’ It decided to dangle, literally dangle, a carrot in front of us. It built the towers as a game. Sure, it could just give us the things we want, but what if we could earn it. It’s scarcity… as entertainment. It’s a massive ecosystem in there. They are worlds of their own, each different, every cycle. People get to colonize, industrialize, invade each other, build cities… for fun. You enter at the start and… do what you want... except leave. The core believes that limitations and pressure cause people to innovate… Unfortunately, I hate to say it, but it’s right. It works… for some. The Core measures innovation, personal growth, cultural production, and the least successful tower?” Robert’s finger rose up with a shockingly callous comedic whistle, “destroyed. And it all starts again”

“How do you know the Ruby tower is going to lose?”

Robert shook his head. “It’s been lagging horribly in the ratings for a year now. We don’t see comebacks like that, these days.” He sighed. “My Dad… Star of the Silver Tower… he pulled back a crisis almost singlehandedly by creating an innovative Threader that would eventually make Fabric threading a handheld task.”

Bec remembered that spooling device that helped Mr. Purple wire up the space expander, so she nodded.

“Now that I know about your Timelet, I guess you could save Ruby yourself if you wanted to. Do you want to?” Robert asked, without a serious thought to the answer.

“I don’t know what I want. If I saved Ruby, I’d be killing another Tower, right? They chose to be there so who am I? I’m just a nobody anyways.”

Robert snorted. “That’s funny. You don’t seem like nobody to me. Who am I? I know.” Robert shifted towards Bec and looked at her with the bright, green eyes that, only now, she could really truly grasp with her sharp new sight, “Who are you, deep down?”

Bec’s mind contorted, flipping between every emotion she thought she could feel. Something about those words resonated in her head like they were a strategic strike to her fragile headspace. She felt like she was plummeting towards choices that she couldn’t possibly understand. The floor was fast approaching, a million different iterations of what she could say next kaleidoscope out in front of her. The beeping of the heart monitor, the crackle of her radiation, the sound of her breath, the feeling of death. Bec’s voice cracked as misshapen tears leaked down her face. “I’m Bec. I—” She paused, and her breath was shaky. The world was uncertain. Everything had changed. Her life has wobbled on a knife’s edge. She said the only thing she knew for a fact anymore.

“I’m Bec and I really don’t want to die.”