The Body Electric

Chapter 20

I slam my palm on the screen, pausing it. My legs give out and I sprawl on the cold, dusty floor, my chest heaving.

I don’t want to believe this is true.

I examine the digi strip, but it’s secure and sealed—it can’t have been tampered with. And Akilah would never fake her death, not like this.

The evidence is right here in front of me, but it’s impossible. There have been no reports of her death.

But the image of her body, torn apart by bombs, is burned into my retinas.

And… I just spoke to her. Not that long ago. She’s fine. She’s fine, she’s fine, she can’t be dead.

With a shaking hand, I start the last vid stored on the digi strip. The date—with the official time stamp authenticating it—glows darkly. One week after Akilah’s death.

The image is of a military bunker of some sort. Cots line the building, and it appears as if the camera is propped up on a pillow, pointing to the center of the room. Jack and a few other men are talking to someone, but I cannot see the person’s face. Then the crowd shifts.

I gasp aloud, my heart stuttering.

Akilah walks before a group of military men. She stands straight and tall—on both her legs. She has no scars. No sign that she was injured, let alone killed.

The group of people are just far enough away that I can’t hear what anyone’s saying, just that it appears as if Akilah’s giving orders. I glance at her uniform. She now has six stars shining on her chest. A few weeks ago, she was barely an officer; now she’s nearly a general.

Jack breaks off from the group talking to Akilah and rushes to the camera and the cot it rests on. He does something I can’t see, but when he turns around, I notice a gold necklace in his hand. The fortune cookie necklace. I touch my own, warm from my body heat, and my fingers curl around the metal, squeezing it. Jack rushes back to Akilah and hands it to her.

The gold chain dangles through her fingers. She looks up at Jack, confused. Says something. I strain my ears, but there’s no sound this time other than muffled, indiscernible voices. Jack says something else, as if he’s trying to explain, but Akilah just shrugs as she leaves the group. The other men snap to attention, saluting Akilah, but Jack just stares at her as she passes a rubbish bin and drops the necklace in it.

The screen fades to black. It slips from my numb fingers.

“What does this mean?” I wonder aloud. That Akilah is dead… but she’s not? She’s fine—but different? She hasn’t seemed different. But she hasn’t said anything about dying, either.

There’s one sure way to find out. I stand up, tapping my fingers on my cuff. My eye and ear bots connect to the cuff, and soon a hologram of Akilah fills my vision.

“What’s wrong?” she asks immediately.

I wipe my face with my hands, feeling the grime smear against the tear tracks. “Akilah—you’re okay, right?”

She laughs—nervously, still worried about my obvious distress. “Yeah, of course I am. What happened? Is it your mother?”

I shake my head, swallowing down the fear and sorrow that had risen inside me. I give her a watery smile. “I was just… someone lied to me,” I say. “I’m sorry to bug you.”

Akilah grins at me. “No worries,” she says. She leans forward, reaching for something I can’t see.

“Akilah?” I ask, my voice hollow.

She freezes and leans slowly back, focusing her attention on me. “Yes?”

“Where’s your necklace?”

She stares at me, confused.

I reach up, tugging the silver chain of my fortune cookie locket out, swinging the charm toward her. “Where’s yours?” I demand.

Akilah touches her neck, but there’s nothing there but the collar of her shirt. “I… um…” Her mind’s racing, as if she has no idea what I’m talking about. I narrow my eyes at her. That necklace was the symbol of our friendship. She got special permission from her commanding officer to wear it under her uniform because she didn’t want to take it off, ever. And she didn’t even notice it was gone?

“I didn’t want to worry you,” Akilah says in a rush, as if she’s reading lines from a play. “It broke, but it should be fixed soon, and—”

“I have to go.” I sever the connection without another goodbye.

My mind’s reeling. My best friend would never just forget about our necklaces. Inside the fortune cookie locket is a small digi strip, one we made together. We both swore to never take it off.

It makes no sense that she doesn’t have it. But it also make no sense that she died, and came back as the kind of person who’d throw away the locket as if it means nothing.

“Jack?” I call, striding across the room. “This was not ‘answers.’ You need to start speaking, now.”

I throw open the door to the room he said he’d wait for me in.

It’s empty.

“Son of a—” I mutter.

The window’s open, a warm breeze blowing. I race to it. It’s low and easy for me to hoist myself over the ledge and drop down on the street on the other side. I gaze around, trying to find Jack, but he’s long gone.