The Cardellian Chronicles Book One: Clinging to Reality

When Alfia woke up, it was dark enough to keep a normal human from seeing, but just barely light enough to allow her advanced eyesight to be able to pick up on the shapes of objects around her, but there weren’t any. It was just a damp and cold room. She propped herself up on her elbow and looked at the door. She was still wearing Jax’s old shirt, but it was damp with something. She looked down at her shirt and screamed. It was covered in blood, and it wasn’t hers. She covered her mouth and sat there gasping until she brought herself to reality and there was a little green light blinking in the corner of her eye, alerting her that her heart rate was at an alarming pace and that she should calm down. She knew that if she closed her eyes it would give her instructions on how to breathe properly and how to calm herself before she had an anxiety attack.

“Hey,” a boy’s voice said in front of her.

Alfia jumped with fright until the boy put his hand on her shoulder, “Nate?”

“Yeah, sweetheart, it’s me.”

“But, you- you can touch me,” She was confused.

“I know. You were at Jax’s place and I was staying up in your head so you could just let go of everything and not have to worry about me. When you woke up the next morning and got drugged, it started a whole system reboot.” He looked as though there was more to the story that he didn’t want to tell her.

“What is it?” she asked.

“You got Hacked, Al. Someone purposely drugged you so that it would start a system reboot and make it easier to slip in and then they Hacked you.”

“Oh my-" the room went a little topsy turvey and she got light headed. "Did I,” she swallowed, “Did I kill Jax?”

“Al, it wasn’t your fault-”

“Did I kill Jax?!?” she screamed.

Nate hung his head, “Yeah. You killed Jax.”

She sat there in a daze, looking straight through him. She had killed her best friend, second only to Benny. “He was going to ask me out,” she said.

“I know.”

“How many days have I been out?” she asked.

“Two and a half. You were Hacked for about twelve hours,” he told her, “Whoever Hacked you didn’t want me to come out, so I was forced to stay in your head. You fought like hell, by the way. They just erased your memory when they were done with you.”

“Who’s they?”

“I don’t know, but they managed to make me human, somehow.”

Alfia rested her head against the wall she was sitting against and thought about the information she had just received. Her whole life was falling to shambles for the second time. She had just lost one of her closest friends. Murdered at her own hand.

“Al, you can’t blame yourself for this. It’s not your fault. You were Hacked,” Nate said gently.

“But it was still my face that he saw last. It was still my hand that did it. His blood is literally on my hands!” she was starting to freak out.

Nate sat in front of her and put one had on her knee and the other on her shoulder, “Al, I need you to calm down, okay?”

She nodded, closing her eyes and taking deep breaths, focusing on him.

“Just breath.”

“Keep talking. It gives me something to focus on.”

He did, apparently not paying attention to what he was saying because a lot of it didn’t make any sense. She laughed after a few minutes when he said that a dragon ate his unicorn and made him so sad that he didn’t eat ice cream for a week.

“What?” she asked, looking up at him with a small smile.

He shrugged, “I was just saying stuff to get you to smile.”

She laughed a little.

“I achieved a laugh, I must have magical powers.”

She laughed again, “St-stop! This is serious, Nate.”

“Yes, very cereal,” he put on an overly-serious face.

She snickered, finally able to calm herself and focus her mind, “Okay, we need to figure out how to get out of here.”

“There’s my girl,” he said triumphantly, standing up and shedding his jacket before shucking his shirt, “Here. It’s probably better than the one you’ve got on now.”

She took it and got to her feet, turning her back to him and glancing over her shoulder to see if he was watching, but he already had his back turned. She took off Jax’s shirt and dropped it to the floor before pulling Nate’s shirt over her head and adjusting it so that it fit her comfortably. When she turned back around, Nate already had his jacket back on.

“You decent?”

“Yeah, you can turn around.”

As soon as he did, a smirk was plastered to his face, “I like you in my shirt.”

She flushed, “We’re trying to get out, remember?”

“Ah, yes. That does sound familiar. Ideas?”

“What, don’t you have any?” she asked.

He gestured to her with a hand, “You’re the genius.”

She grinned, “Yes, I am. Now how does the door work? Is it a code? Or is it a lock and key?”

She pressed her hand against it and listened for an electric hum. There wasn't one.

“Of course. It’s a regular door,” she paced a couple times, “Do you have a knife?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“I need it.”

Nate handed her his knife and she went back to the door and wedged it between the pin and hinge and wiggled it until she could pull the pin out with her hands and then dropped it on the floor. She did it with the other two hinges, Nate coming over and holding the door so as to keep it from falling and crushing Alfia under its weight without being asked. She dropped the final pin and moved as Nate carried the door to the wall and leaned it against the solid concrete. Alfia poked her head out and looked around the hallway. She waved Nate to follow her and walked out quickly, her bare feet making virtually no sound against the cold tile. They ran around the cement walled facility until they found a door that looked like an exit. They went through the door and found a room full of computer monitors, each playing the same event from a different angle. Alfia walked farther into the room as though in a trance and looked at all of them. A blue coupe car was suddenly seen on the screens, passing different cameras and then there was someone standing in front of the car and the it swerved before flipping. Alfia watched in horror until Nate pulled her to his chest and blocked her view of the screens, but continued to watch himself. She was shaking against him.

“Freeze frame,” A man’s voice rang out from somewhere in the room.

The feed on every one of the screens paused.

“Zoom in on the man in the corner,” the voice ordered.

Alfia looked up at the screens and saw none other than the face of the man that had haunted her dreams since the night her parents died.

“Benny,” she breathed.

“Very good,” the voice was closer and more identifiable.

“But how could he have done that? He looks the same way he does now.” she was confused.

“The answer is simple, Alfie. Time travel.” Benny was now standing in front of them.

“Then you- you-” the world flipped over as she turned to face him, tears streaming down her face, “You’re the reason my parents are dead.”

“Yes,” he said without the slightest hing of remorse in his voice. As though it were a simple fact without any sort of controversy.

She frowned, “But why?”

“Because a few weeks ago, I started to lose my memory. Any memories of the two of us began to fade away and it took me a while to realize why. I had already worked out the time travel formula, it was just a matter of using it for the right purpose at the right time. I realized that I was losing my memories because I was the one who killed your parents and it was getting closer to the time that I was supposed to jump across time and do it.” He explained.

“But why the Virus?” she asked after grappling for words for a for moments, “You’ve got Tech in you, too.”

“No I don’t.”

“I-i-i don’t understand. Why? Why are you doing all of this?”

He shrugged, “I got bored.”

“Have you ever cared for me?” she asked.

“Yes. That’s why I went back and killed your parents.”

“You do know that your Virus will kill me, too,” she pointed out.

“Yes.”

“And you’re okay with that?”

“Perfectly.”

Alfia took a few steps back, “So what’s your whole grand plan, Benny?”

“To put an end to anyone with the Tech in them. They’re not human anymore, Alfie. Don’t you see? As soon as the wires are placed in their bodies, they become inhuman. Machines.”

“The Tech saves lives! It saved mine! You-” she let out a laugh, “You talk about inhuman? Take a look in the mirror, Benny.”

She turned to leave.

“I made you who you are! Without me, you would be nothing!” he cried.

She whirled on him, “You ruined my life! I had a family! I had parents who loved me! You took all of that away! Did you never think I would find out? Did you never think I would figure out it was you who created the Virus?” she shouted.

“You came close once. After that night at Orchard. I had to take your papers and burn them to keep you from figuring it out,” he said.

“Why?!? Why would you do this?” she screamed.

“I needed you, Alfie.”

“Don’t,” she snapped, her voice colder than the arctic circle, “Don’t call me that. You don’t need me. You can do just fine without me. And now you’re going to have to.” She went for the door again.

“You can’t escape me, Alfie. I’ll always find you. No matter where you go, where you hide, how well you hide, I will find you. I can promise you that.” His voice had a horrible darkness that she had never heard before.

Alfia walked towards him, fists clenched and steeling herself to do what needed to be done when Nate jumped in front of her and did it for her. He tore his knife out of Alfia’s hand and slit Benny’s throat with it.

“Nate!” Alfia cried in surprise.

He watched Benny’s body fall to the ground, “I couldn’t let you do it. You would never forgive yourself. We need to go. Now. He’s sped up the Virus’s movements. It’s going to reach you a lot faster now.”

“What about you?” she asked.

“I’m human now, sweetheart. It can’t touch me.”

She nodded, numbly staring at Benny’s body, his blood steadily spreading around him on the ground. To think that she was going to do it, that she was about to kill her best friend, was terrifying.

“Alfia, we need to go. Benny had guards and other people all over the place in here. We need to go and we need to hide,” Nate told her.

She nodded again.

He realized she was in shock and pulled her along with him as he made his way through the compound Benny had locked them up in. She slipped and fell, but he caught her and started to carry her bridal style. She was numb. Her two closest friends were dead, one by her own hand and the other because he actually deserved it. She didn’t understand. Why would Benny kill her parents? Why would he make a computer virus that would kill so many people and in the process kill the person he claimed to need so much? How did she not see it? She thought back to the coding. She had recognized it. But Benny apparently had no coding. He had stolen it. He had killed someone and stolen their Basic Coding before building a Skin around it and having Alfia believe that she wasn’t alone. And all for what? There had to be some sort of a bigger picture. And how had he managed to make Nathaniel human? None of it made any sense. Since meeting Nate all those months ago, she had looked into ways to make A.I.’s human and had yet to find anything. How had Benny done it? How had she not realized that the face that haunted her nightmares was Benny’s? It was all too confusing. His plan was too deep. Too elaborate. Too chaotic. She didn’t understand.

“Stay with me, Al,” Nate’s voice brought her back to Earth and she realized that her breathing was rapid and shallow. If she didn’t get a hold on it, she would pass out from hyperventilating.

She frowned, “Are you carrying me?” she asked as she realized that her feet weren’t on the ground.

“Yeah.”

Then she remembered that he was human. How odd that after months of wishing that he was, she kept forgetting. She chided herself, there were much bigger problems to worry about than how her friend had become human. She had people to worry about. People who might die if she didn’t figure out how the Virus worked and how to stop it. Alfia felt her breathing get faster and heard Nate talking to her, but his words sounded like one big dampened rush of sound, as if she were in a tunnel and his voice was nothing but a bunch of echos trying to tell her the same thing at different times. She knew she was hyperventilating and that it would make her pass out, as she already was, but she couldn’t calm herself down enough to breathe normally. Then the world went dark and she went limp in Nate’s arms.