The Toll (Arc of a Scythe) - Neal Shusterman Page 0,147

last thing you remember?”

“Sebastian Selva,” he said. “I was having dinner on a ship, heading to a new job assignment.”

“Perfect!” said the young woman. “That’s exactly what you should remember.”

The welder sat up and recognized the type of capsule he was in. Lead lined and full of contact electrodes, like a medieval iron maiden, but with a much softer touch. That kind of capsule was used for only one thing.

When the realization came, it felt like someone had suddenly pulled a string and tightened his spine. He let out a shuddering breath. “Oh crap, was I … was I supplanted?”

“Yes and no,” the girl said, looking both sympathetic and perky at once.

“Who was I before?”

“You were … you!” she told him.

“But … didn’t you say I was supplanted?”

“Yes and no,” she told him again. “That’s really all I can say, Mr. Selva. Once I leave, you’ll need to stay in this cabin for about an hour after leaving port.”

“So … am I still on the ship?”

“You’re on a different ship, and I’m happy to say that your job is completed. The ship sets sail soon. Once it does, your door will unlock itself automatically when you’re far enough out to sea.”

“Then what?”

“Then you’ll have full run of the ship, along with many others in your exact situation. Which means you’ll have a lot to talk about!”

“No, I mean … afterward.”

“After your journey, you’ll return to your life. I’m sure the Thunderhead has everything set up for you in…” She looked at her tablet. “In … the Isthmus region. Ooh! I’ve always wanted to go there, and see the Isthmus Canal!”

“I’m from there,” said the welder. “But am I, really? If I was supplanted, then my memories aren’t real.”

“Don’t they feel real?”

“Well … yes.”

“That’s because they are, silly.” She rapped him playfully on the shoulder. “But I do have to warn you … there’s been a bit of a time lapse.”

“Time lapse? How much of a time lapse?”

She looked at her tablet again. “It’s been three years and three months since you were having dinner on that other ship, on your way to your last job.”

“But I don’t even remember where that job was…”

“Exactly,” she said with a broad smile. “Bon voyage!” And she proceeded to shake his hand a little bit longer than necessary before she left.

It had been Loriana’s idea.

There were simply too many workers wanting to get back to their lives on the mainland, wherever that mainland was – but even without direct communication from the Thunderhead, its message was clear: Anyone who leaves Kwajalein would be immediately supplanted and left with no memory of who they were or what they’d been doing there. Yes, the Thunderhead would give them new identities that were substantially better than the ones they left behind – but even so, few people were keen on the idea. Self-preservation, after all, was an instinct.

Loriana, while no longer anything close to a Nimbus agent, was in charge of the limited one-way communication to the Thunderhead, and so, over time, she had become the one who people came to with requests and complaints.

“Can’t we please get a greater variety of cereal brought to the atoll?”

“It would be nice to have companion animals!”

“The new bridge connecting the larger islands needs a dedicated bike lane.”

“Yes, of course,” Loriana would tell them. “I’ll see what I can do.”

And when the more reasonable requests were fulfilled, people would thank her. What these people didn’t realize was that she did nothing to bring those things about – it was the Thunderhead who heard them, without her intercession, and effected a response, sending more cereal and a variety of pets on the next supply ship, or assigning workers to paint lines for a bike lane.

This place was no longer a blind spot for the Thunderhead after they had finally dropped a fiber optic cable along the seafloor all the way out to the edge of the affected area. The Thunderhead could now see, hear, and otherwise sense things on the islands of the atoll – albeit not as thoroughly as it did in the rest of the world, but well enough. It was limited, because everything – even person-to-person communication – had to be hardwired, since transmission interference still made wireless communication sketchy. Plus, any communication might be intercepted by the scythedom, and the Thunderhead’s secret place would no longer be a secret. It was all very twentieth-century retro, which some liked, and others did not. Loriana was fine with it.