Hero (Gone 9)

“You think the Dark Watchers are the hackers?” Shade asked for the benefit of Dekka and Cruz, since she knew almost as much about it as Malik did, give or take a college-level physics course.

Malik shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t know. Maybe we’re a TV show. Maybe we’re a game. Maybe we’re something our three-dimensional brains can’t even describe.” He winced, closed his eyes as if in pain. Sometimes the attention of the Dark Watchers was so intrusive it felt like a kind of pain. After a moment Malik continued. “The question is: Francis.”

“I can hear you,” Francis said, coming back in, reaching for the overflowing platter of pastries, and pausing to ask, “Can anyone have these?”

“Francis, eat,” Cruz said.

“You’re an anomaly,” Malik said, turning to address Francis. “Everyone else who has taken the rock has three things in common.” He ticked them off on his fingers. “One: they’ve been changed physically, given a morph, sometimes vaguely animal, other times . . .” He shrugged. “Second: a power, an ability that defies conventional physics. And third: the Dark Watchers in your head anytime you’re in morph.”

“All except Francis,” Shade said. “Morph? Yes, that whole prismatic, rainbowy thing she does. Power? Definitely. But no Watchers. Why?”

Malik sighed. “Well, babe . . .” He froze for a moment and shot a guilty look at Shade. “I mean, Shade, that just, um . . . slipped out.”

Shade smiled, a rare occurrence, especially recently. “You know, bunny, I kind of don’t think our secret is much of a secret.”

“What?” Cruz erupted in mock surprise. “Shade and Malik?”

“I’m shocked,” Dekka said in a perfectly flat voice.

“Anyway,” Malik said, too loudly.

“Don’t ever try to stop Malik once he’s got his lecture on,” Shade said.

“As I was saying—”

“So? How was it?” Cruz interrupted, batting her eyelashes.

Malik gaped at her in shock, his mouth open.

But Shade, in a low, marveling voice said, “Like you’ve fallen off a cliff and you’re going to die and then, suddenly, a hand grabs you and hauls you back up.” She made a face meant, belatedly, to make it seem like a joke.

Well, well, she’s human.

“So,” Malik persisted, his voice a bit desperate, “The point is if we are living in a sim, then what we always saw as the immutable laws of physics are just so

much software, the OS of this universe. And software can be rewritten. The fact is, none of this superpower stuff is possible, not under the laws of reality we’ve always accepted. Someone, something, has rewritten the program that defined those laws of physics.”

Francis had kept well clear of the gentle teasing. Dekka knew she did not yet feel like she was really part of the group, and probably felt young besides.

“If we’re just some program, then . . . well, what?” Francis asked.

Malik shrugged. “Nothing changes, really. We cannot help but feel real because we are real, subjectively. I think, therefore I am, as Descartes said.”

“Who’s day cart?” Francis wondered aloud.

“No, no,” Shade said, shaking her head. “Whatever you do, don’t get him off on a tangent.”

“We experience real emotions, real pain, at least it’s real to us,” Malik went on, trying to float above the constant interruptions. “At one level it all doesn’t change anything, real or sim. But . . .”

“But?” Dekka prompted, trying to resist a croissant and wondering if she could use the Caesars gym without being interrupted by people wanting to get a selfie with a Rockborn mutant freak.

“But Francis doesn’t even conform to the ‘new’ rules. She doesn’t feel the Dark Watchers. And more to the point, her power is not limited to our three dimensions. She can move into extra dimensions. Maybe,” he said, with slow emphasis, “into their dimension.”

They heard the door of the suite being unlocked, and Armo came back wearing a bathing suit, flip-flops, and a towel draped over his shoulders. “What are you guys talking about?”

“Extradimensional space and multiple universes,” Malik said.

“So, I’m not missing anything. Anyway I just came back to get my shades. It’s sunny and hot as hell, and they serve nachos at the pool. You guys should check it out. How about you, Cruz? Come on,” he pleaded in a wheedling voice, “I need someone to hang out with and I’ve heard all of Dekka’s stories at least twice.”