Accessing the Future: A Disability-Themed Anthology of Speculative Fiction (12 page)

Aiden made an obscene gesture right in her face. “I’m going to make you regret that, Gipson. Just wait. My father has friends in registration. The next time we meet, it’ll be in the tournament!” He turned.

“Great!” Bren cheered after him. “It’s going to be fun
kicking your ass
in front of half of Dome Central!”

Aiden went back to his call with the underling. “Now listen here. I don’t care if you had to fend off an entire fucking army of feral canids. You get your asses and my droid out here or…”

Bren moved on, walking down Mechanic’s Lane until the storefronts were a bit less flashy and the merchandise a bit less expensive. Fang was parked at Old Warrant’s garage—one of the few mechanics that allowed pilots to rent his space and tools, and didn’t grouse when they opted to do their own repair work.

Warrant wasn’t in when she got back, which was just as well. He was a suspicious old codger and not too keen on hybrids after one crushed his leg years back. Warrant actually got off lucky compared to some. He could afford surgery to replace the limb with robotic cybergear. The enhancement legally ended his piloting career. Droid fighting, after all, was a test of human skill, not of human-enhanced-with-robotics skill. But giving up piloting, he claimed, was a small price to pay to be normal again. Bren thoroughly disagreed. One more reason she was glad Warrant wasn’t there.

Bren dumped her baskets and began to sort through the pile of scrap she had painstakingly salvaged out of discount bins. A necessary precaution. Her older brother, Brice, didn’t exactly factor in Bren’s secret piloting career as part of her expenses when he wired her monthly funds. But Bren was no scrapper, and the tedium quickly irritated her.

This is your own damn fault, you know. If you just stayed put in mom’s belly like you were supposed to instead of popping out early, you would have had been born with normal eyes. You could be a pilot like everyone else and wouldn’t have to sneak around building a half-feral droid with junk parts. Or lie to the only family you’ve got about how you’ve been spending your spare time.

Bren had a mental flash of Aiden Victor and his family’s army of mechanics, and her mood soured even more. Come lights-out, Aiden would have a full belly and be sleeping well, knowing his droid would be in pristine condition for the battles to come. Bren would be lucky if she caught a few winks in Fang’s cockpit. She couldn’t afford to rent both Warrant’s space and a hotel at tournament prices. Plus, thanks to the expense of fixing Fang, she’d have to go without dinner, too.

Sadly, her situation wasn’t uncommon for a novice pilot. One more reason Bren ached to be on a team. Droid team pilots were given food and their own room in the team rig. Not to mention a fair cut of the winnings.

Of course, being on a team would bring up another complication—hiding her bad eyesight. Despite all the advances in society and technology, the Droid Battle Committee was still hesitant to alter its no-tolerance stance on pilots with physical limitations. Why exactly, Bren didn’t know, though she theorized corporate ass-covering played a significant part. As things stood, only pilots in “peak physical condition, as determined by a legitimate medical-scan” could participate. Which, in this day and age, was a bunch of shit.

Fang’s repairs weren’t complicated this time—mostly prying out bullets and replacing damaged minor circuits. Nothing Fang’s internal repair program couldn’t handle with a few days in sleep-mode. But Bren didn’t have the luxury of time during a tournament.

Hours later, weary to the bone, Bren rested against one of her droid’s hind legs.

“Get some rest, Fang. You earned it.”

Fang gave a soft
viruummm
. The sound Bren equated to a sigh. Then Fang’s minor systems powered down and Bren heard the faint whir of Fang’s core entering sleep mode.

Outside, headlights blared, lighting the space beside her for a moment. The chugging engine of a transport droid idled just outside the back entrance. Bren strained to hear.

“You can’t bring that in here,” Davon, one of Warrant’s staff, insisted hotly. Bren caught snippets of other voices, too.

“…emergency!” argued a woman, clearly annoyed.

“…friends with the owner…” a younger man pleaded.

Davon wasn’t impressed. “Well, Warrant ain’t here. And he’s the only one who handles droids with feral cores.”

The young man again. “Already bought the taming chip… just need… can’t just leave my droid like—”

“What part of NO don’t you understand?”

“Now you listen here, you witless lugnut…” the woman snapped. Bren couldn’t quite catch all of the rest, only that it was one hell of a telling-off. She didn’t know if Davon really deserved it. After all, it wasn’t his fault that Warrant insisted on handling all the taming chip replacements himself. Bren thought about stepping in and defending Davon. Then, Bren’s stomach growled and she got a better idea.

Grabbing her multi-pocketed utility belt and a pair of customized, high-powered goggles, Bren met the woman and the young man just as they were about to drive away.

“Hey, hold up. So, I couldn’t help overhearing your little predicament.”

The woman leaned out of her hauler droid’s cockpit, revealing her cybergear right arm. She had customized the gear as only a scrapper could—soldering on holders for tools and hatches for hidden compartments. She had even painted the limb purple to match the dyed tips of her hair. “Yeah, the kid fried his droid senseless and had shit timing about it. What’s it to you?”

“Well, I was thinkin’ I could install the chip for you. It won’t take long. Ten minutes tops.”

“You a mechanic?” The woman was suspicious. No surprise there—most scrappers were. Bren wasn’t sure how specific she should be. Her mother dealt with scrap traders from all over—before she and Bren’s father were killed—but that didn’t mean she was especially well-liked among them.

“Occasionally,” Bren answered, deciding to be vague for now. “My family ran a garage.”

The young man, who still looked half a boy, seemed to perk up.

“How much?” the woman asked.

“I’d settle for a hot meal and a bed for the night.” There was an uncertain silence. Bren shrugged. “What? I’m hungry. And I know what a taming chip cost you at tournament prices.”

Another pause. The boy chewed his lip. “My team’s rig is parked outside the city. I’m sure our manager won’t mind if you crash on the couch.” The boy glanced at the woman like her say was the deciding factor.

“Don’t look at me, kid. It ain’t my droid that’s busted.”

He looked back to Bren. “Okay, deal. But you’ll have to fix my droid first, since I need it to get back.”

“Fair enough.”

Bren walked to the back of the woman’s hauler and hiked herself up onto the flatbed where the boy’s jacklin droid was lashed. A moment later, she heard clumsy movement behind her.

“Here, let me help you.” The boy offered her a leg up to his droid’s shoulder. “Thanks again. You’re really doing me a huge favor. I’m Pitt, by the way, from team Howler.”

“Bren,” said Bren.

Bren and Pitt reached the jacklin’s back. A power restraining collar kept the droid from attacking, but Bren knew from the warmth of the metal that it wasn’t happy. Core access, if she recalled right, was at the back of the head. Still, Bren let Pitt guide her as the sky-image darkened.

“Hey, Nadine. Can we get some light up here?” he called down to his companion just as a pair of blinding spots lit up his face. “Ahhhk!”

The woman, Nadine, had slipped atop her hauler without a sound. Now her outline stood on an adjacent pile of crates fiddling with a third spotter lamp.

“Thank you,” mumbled a dazed Pitt.

Bren smiled appreciatively as she blinked away purple spots.

“Nice. You wire these in yourself?”

“Yeah. To keep thieves away at night. Doesn’t do much for ferals though. I’ve been trying to petition specs to the Battle Committee to let me install a pulse rifle to chase ’em off.” She made a snorting sound and mumbled, “Waste of fuckin’ time.”

“That sucks,” Bren agreed, slipping on her goggles and retrieving an auto-screwdriver from her belt. She unscrewed the jacklin’s core hatch by feel. But she kept her head down for appearances.

“Bunch of nosy manual-quoters…” Nadine was ranting. “My security shouldn’t be any of their damn business, seein’ as how I’m the one braving the badlands while they sit in their cushy offices.”

“I hear that. Some of the Committee’s rules have been giving me trouble, too.” The hatch came free, letting out a hiss of smoke. Inside a display screen wired to a circuit board flashed red warning errors.

“Must have been some battle,” Bren muttered, zooming in her goggles to examine the damage.

“Yeah, kinda,” said Pitt.

“Don’t you have a mechanic on staff?”

“He had to stay behind to guard the rig. Local scans reported a pack of ferals roaming the area.”

Nadine huffed. “See. This is exactly what I’m talkin’ about.”

Bren pulled out more instruments. Even with the droid’s damage, her hands moved with routine ease. For all the smoke and noise of Pitt’s jacklin, Bren had repaired worse. A few minutes later, she retrieved the new taming chip from Pitt.

“I wonder what makes droids go feral like that,” he mused as she worked. “I mean, you would think they’d be smart enough to realize they’d have a better, safer life if they just accepted the taming program.”

“Safer, maybe. Better…? How can a life be better if you don’t get to choose how to live it?” Bren’s fingers slipped, just a hair, and her instrument sent up a spark that singed her hand. “Damn it! Can you adjust the light a little?”

“Sure,” Pitt moved to comply. “So, what? We should get rid of taming chips?”

“If the droid doesn’t want to accept the program, I think that should be their choice, not ours.”

Nadine spoke up. “That’s a noble thought, but if we start givin’ droids a choice, what makes you think they won’t choose to kill us all? Ain’t that what happened with the Ancients? The beasts got too smart. Tried to take over or some such.”

“I’ve heard that story, too,” Pitt chimed in. “Back when the sky was still open, and animals were made of flesh, just like humans. There was a huge war. In the end, the Ancients had to wipe out the other species to save themselves. It’s why they built the first droids. To take up the role of the animals after the world went to shit.”

“I’m not saying there isn’t a risk,” Bren clarified, not looking up. “But maybe if we treated them with respect instead of like slaves, the droids wouldn’t have a reason to turn on us.” She finished the final touch-ups and slipped her instruments away. “Right. All done. Now we just need to see if your droid accepted the program. Power down the collar, and I’ll reset the core manually.”

Pitt hesitated. “But isn’t that dangerous?”

“Only if it doesn’t work.”

Bren hunched behind Pitt in his droid’s cockpit as they bade farewell to Nadine. Part of her envied the woman. Nadine had conquered her physical limitation with some kick-ass cybergear and was still able to do what she loved. If Bren got cybergear for her eyes, she could never legally pilot a droid again.

Bren chose piloting, hands down, which would have been fine if her brother agreed. But Brice Gipson was a mechanic to his bones. If something was broken, like say, Bren’s eyes, he was obligated to fix them. He had even taken up their father’s old droid, Shadowrunner, and become a pilot to earn the money for Bren’s surgery. He was on a team and everything. And Brice didn’t even like piloting.

When they arrived at the Howler team rig, Pitt directed Bren up one level to the lounge.

“Make yourself at home. I’ll go let my manager know you’ll be staying.”

Unlike the droid parking space below, the rig upstairs was cozier, with painted walls, carpets and plush couches fit for human habitation. On the furthest end, delicious smells wafted from a small, partially concealed kitchen.

Bren waited, bouncing lightly on her toes, stomach growling.

“So, you comin’ to the semi-finals with us tomorrow?” A young woman asked from the kitchen.

A male voice responded, too muffled by the stove vent to understand.

“Pahf,” said the woman, “and you call yourself a pilot. I need someone who actually cares about the audition lineups to talk with. Where’d Pitt run off to?”

Muffled laughter and a remark that made the woman snort.

“Boyfriend? That little twerp? Yeah, right. He
wishes
he had this.” She shifted in her chair, giving Bren a clear view as she spanked herself playfully.

“Wishes I had what?” Pitt asked as he entered with the most perfect timing ever.

The mumbling teammate by the stove raised his voice and answered.

“Meara’s sweet, sweet booty.”

Bren perked up. She knew that voice!

She pushed past Pitt into the small dining area, barely dodging the wadded-up napkin aimed, piss-poorly, at her brother Brice’s head.

“Bren—?” Brice nearly dropped an entire kettle of protein stew on his foot.

“Brice, holy shit, it is you!”

Brice moved to embrace her, and Bren met his hug. He was leaner then she remembered and had grown his hair out, but there was no mistaking her big brother. He smelled of engine grease and just a hint of their father’s aftershave. She buried her face in his shirt and inhaled the familiar scents of home.

Pitt cleared his throat. “Oh, you two know each other?”

Her brother replied, “Pitt, Meara, this is Brenna, my baby sister.”

Bren laughed, a little more dryly then she meant to, and pulled away. “I’m not such a baby anymore, Brice.”

“What are you even doing here?”

Oh, nothing much. Just fighting in the Auditions with the half-feral droid I secretly built using your design specs.

Pitt relayed the events at Warrant’s without skipping any details.

“I meant, what are you doing here in Dome Central?” Brice clarified when Pitt finally finished. There was an accusatory edge in his voice. Bren wasn’t surprised; her brother knew the hell-raising she was capable of better than anyone. He also knew she wasn’t above lying to get out of trouble. But having such mistrust before Bren had even offered an explanation pissed her off.