61: Finally, the Call

61: Finally, the Call

“If you're going to call your son, I must advise you that while he may know about the existence of the Exodus Union as a political entity, he is not allowed to know anything I have told you about our Callisto facility, or Exodus City, is that clear?” The doctor told us with a kind smile. When we both nodded, she left mum and me to our own devices.

We returned to our seats, while the dark haired doctor wandered over to a hot drinks bar. Mum watched her go with a blank expression, then sighed and turned to me. “Time to finally call your brother.”

I nodded, already feeling a little anxious. This was a lot to dump on him, especially if he was busy or something...

Mum opened a virtual computer window and shared visibility of it with me. Then, pulling up the universal communications app that had replaced most phone calls, text messaging, and simple chat functions, mum scrolled through her contacts until she got to my brother's name. Kajii Riku.

She didn't click the button, though. Her finger hovered there—hesitating.

“Mum?”

She took a deep breath. “Sorry, sorry.”

She touched the button, then swiped sideways to initiate a video call rather than a basic voice call. It sat there, ringing and ringing for almost a minute before it picked up.

My brother's face filled the screen, at an angle that suggested he was on his phone rather than in VR. We'd looked pretty similar before I became Keiko. Before I'd... transitioned. He had dad's severe eyebrows for sure, and he was attempting to emulate his close-cut beard. It was close, but not totally there yet. His hair was actually pretty long, for a guy, and it was swept into artful waves and curves that appeared natural, even if they definitely weren't.

His dark eyes flashed with irritation when he saw mum. “Oh. Fiona. What do you want?”

Then, his eyes drifted to me, and I saw him do a double, then triple take. “Uh...”

For probably the last time, I allowed my UN social account to identify me in a tooltip for him.

His big eyebrows rose by degrees until they were partially covered by his prettily curved fringe. “Oh. Uh... Rosc— uh...”

“Hey dude, how've you been?” I asked, using every ounce of self control to keep my tone and expression casual.

“Working—It’s been busy,” he said, probably on autopilot. He was clearly still processing my new ‘look’. “Uh... you're wearing an interesting body. Must be... VR?”

“Kinda...” I said cagily, turning to look at mum.

“Riku...” she began, then trailed off, as if waiting for another hostile remark.

God, I wish... their falling out had not been pretty, but it'd also been inevitable. When Riku chose the course he wanted to chart through life... It was over from there.

When my brother didn't immediately snark at her, she continued, “Did you hear about the attack on the Hamilton City LTCH? The SAI run one?”

Confused, my brother nodded. “Yeah? If you're going to blame me, it wasn't us. It was a paramilitary group hired by—” he cut himself off. Probably ‘classified’ or some shit.

“We were there,” I said simply.

The colour drained from his face in noticeable increments as he followed his thoughts from conclusion to conclusion. Finally, he croaked, “You were there? How... nobody made it out alive... unless...”

“We were forced by the circumstances to become digital, yes,” mum said with a solemn nod.

Distressed, he turned aside and ran his fingers through his hair—Messing up the perfect style in the process. “But that means... you're with—You were saved by them.”

“The Exodus, yes,” Mum said, surprising me. We'd only just learned of their existence—Ah, but considering his job, he probably knew about them before we did.

“Fuck!” He swore, placing his phone on the ground. He wandered out of frame for a couple of seconds, until we saw a flash of movement—A decanter filled with a dark amber liquid. We heard him pouring, then the view suddenly changed, and we were looking at him sitting on an expensive sofa in an apartment. Out the window behind him was a gorgeous view of United Nations City. It was evening there, and the sunset could be seen dancing along the waves below the city. The whole place was built out in the ocean on stilts. I'd been there once, when I was young, and at the time it'd seemed like some sort of incredible fantasy land.

“Fuck,” my brother said again after he'd taken a swig of his drink. “You can't... you have to get out. Maybe I can swing it past my superiors. Get you some servers somewhere until we get you android bodies. I could even put them here, pay for the power myself—”

“Riku,” mum said gently. “We're going to accept their offer to become citizens of their new nation. We looked through their charter, their constitution or whatever they call it. It was very good. I liked it a lot, personally.”

“No!” Riku blurted, fear widening his eyes. “That— No! Bad idea. That isn't safe, we're... uh, there's...”

As I watched, another batch arrived nearby and, to the consternation of their intended guide, ran over to the first group. Hugs were given, the fluffy girl started squeezing an elf girl really hard, then she moved on to another girl— wait, was that a boy? Nevermind, I was snooping. I should let them be.

“Oh, we can have non-human traits?” Mum asked, having seen them too.

“You can have whatever body you like, within reason,” the doctor said. “I'm afraid we have to keep you around human size, or we'd have issues with space. Every cubic metre of simulation takes computing power, and frankly, the civil engineers haven't exactly been kind to the physical infrastructure folks.”

She said the last part with a wry chuckle and a gesture at the massive room we were in. I could see her point... if space was limited by the processing power of the computers, well...

“Anyways,” she said, beginning to walk towards one of the exits. “If you'll come with me, we have several important things to do before I can leave you to your own devices.”

Beginning to follow, I noticed four people rushing in through the exit we were going to take. They hurried over to nearby metal pads and stood there. One of them quickly ran his fingers through his hair, and as he did so, each set of pads gained a whole bunch of new people. They phased into existence in much the same way we must've just before. Immediately the four began to greet the newcomers, and I realised that they were welcoming them to Exodus City... but they hadn’t arrived with us like the doctor had?

“Huh, how come they’re getting greeters they don’t know, but you personally took us in like that?” I asked as we stepped into a long passage.

The doctor chuckled and looked at the both of us. “I wanted to personally greet the girl and her mother who gave me time to save all those people. Several people owe their lives to you, and I’m not just talking about the people who were in that room with us. Your stalling held the terrorists back from getting to multiple wards like that one until after we were done.”

“Oh,” I said, feeling a blush come on. Well then, that was pretty cool.

Leaving the hallway, we stepped out onto a huge promenade that ringed the entire domed entry hall. At regular intervals all around the huge walkway were stairs that led down to little skyrail stations, which had bustling traffic heading from one to the next. This was the city transportation hub! Gosh, and the greenery. The promenade was big enough to have big pretty planters full of trees, flowers, and all sorts. The skyrail stations were shaded by these really cool peaked roofs too—They started out in the typical upside-down V shape, but then they curved downward and then suddenly curled up into a wave. I could also see how the curve could potentially act as a gutter for when it rained—If it did rain here.

“You’re lucky you’re arriving after we formed the government,” the doctor said, laughing to herself. “Not that the previous system of—let’s say, ‘controlled anarchy’—didn’t work, but... things could get a little chaotic sometimes. Now, we have a standard rubric for new arrivals that we can follow.”

We were heading for a stair that appeared to descend down the side of the large transport hub’s foundations. When we reached it, I was a little awestruck at how big this place was. It must’ve been a hundred metres to the ground from here.

“Before we keep going, I’d like to know your name, if that’s okay?” Mum asked sweetly. “You’ve been so kind and helpful to us, so...”

“Sirona,” our guide said, giving my mum a happy smile. “It’s my pleasure, really. The Exodus hasn’t had as much need for medical practitioners recently, so I’ve been branching out, but even then I’m bored.”

“Branching out?” Mum asked, intrigued.

“Into counterintelligence,” Sirona said with a sly look in my direction.

Mum caught the look. She opened her mouth to ask further questions, then frowned and gave the spy-doctor a pointed look. “Sirona?”

“You do have a fascinating son,” she said innocently.

Sighing, mum shook her head, then to my surprise, she grinned. “Good. That boy has sailed through life getting far too much of what he wants. Perhaps it’s time he was humbled a little.”

“That is partially your fault,” I pointed out. “You kinda doted on him. I was the forgotten child barely treading water.”

“Dearest daughter, I did my best with you, but you were never easy, either,” my mother said with a raised eyebrow. “For one thing, you knew full well that you could come to me with your problems. Even when you desperately needed help, you attempted to bull your way through the obstacle via brute force determination.”

Flushing, I looked out over the gorgeous city and did my best to ignore her words. I prided myself on my independent ability to handle my issues.

That appeared to stall the conversation long enough for mum to turn her steely eyed glare back on Sirona. “If you need any help, let me know. Now, where are we headed?”

The region of the city around this large transport hub was actually really cool. None of the buildings within several blocks of the marble edifice were taller than it, but as you went further out, they got taller until there were skyscrapers that punched up just far enough to poke above the first layer of clouds, but no further. The buildings directly around us were really pretty, too, and they crawled up the side of the hub like slumped jenga towers. There was a central theme going on too, with very few straight lines, lots of walkways and gentle terracing, greenery, and big windows. My brain couldn’t decide what the style was called, until I realised that it was actually two, neither of which I knew the name of. When I tried to access the net in an attempt to search them up, I found that I couldn’t access it at all.

I stopped in my tracks, and both women with me turned to look. I think they’d been talking.

“I can’t google what the architecture down there reminds me of,” I said, answering their questioning stares.

Sirona smiled and nodded towards the end of the stairs we were descending. There was a building that matched the dominant merged style I was curious about, and it looked for all the world like a large tourist welcoming centre plopped on top of another one of the jenga-tower building piles.

“You’re thinking of pueblo revival and prairie, with the added caveat that straight lines are to be used minimally,” she explained. “As for the net, we’re going to fix that now. See, when we digitised you, we didn’t give you the full suite of digi-frame enhancements or programs. Now, we can fix that by letting you customise them—A pick-and-mix operating system, if you will.”

“Oh, that sounds fun,” mum said enthusiastically.

She wasn’t wrong, either. It really did sound fun.