I Am Not Junco Omnibus: Books Four - Six (53 page)

HOUSE is chatty and busy in the morning. She makes me breakfast from the autocook, blueberry pancakes, and we eat them out on the terrace.

"Ya feelin' better today, HOUSE?"

She itches her nose as she chews, rubbing snot all over her face, and then speaks with her mouth full. "Yeth."

I can totally see why people have kids now. She's pretty damn cute. "Well, I have the doctor coming anyway, just ta make sure." Regardless of what she says, she doesn't look better at all. She's still flushed, her nose is practically dripping, and her chest is starting to make a strange sound when she exhales.

She ignores my comment about the doctor and shovels more pancakes in her mouth. At least her appetite is good.

"So, have ya talked to Junco, HOUSE? Since she's been in the Pillar?" There's no real easy way to approach this subject, so fuck it. Might as well just be direct.

"Uh-uh," she says again with her mouth full, but I can't really tell if that was a yes or a no. A few more chews and a swallow later and she's ready to give it another try. "No, I can't talk to Junco. She's far away now. But I can feel her."

I eat some pancakes, trying not to get too excited, and wait to see if she continues on her own. It takes a few more bites of food, but she eventually has more to say.

"She's at peace, ya know."

"Yeah?" I ask. "So she doesn't want to come home?"

"Nope. I asked her to, though." She looks up at me with her large eyes and stops her fork midway to her mouth. "I did ask her, Tier, after she said that. But she didn't answer."

"Do ya think we could convince her to come home, if we tried real hard?" I swirl my pancakes in some syrup. "I mean, she likes us, right? Maybe she'd come back for us?"

HOUSE just shrugs and I drop it because Ryse ports in.

"Inside," I tell Ryse. He follows me into the apartment and I close the terrace door so HOUSE can't hear. "Did ya find Layla?"

"Yeah, she's doing rounds on the morph ship, she can't get here until later. We've got more than a hundred thousand avians in morph right now, so she's a little busy. Can't you get a doctor here for the kid?"

"She's not a kid, Ryse. She's—well fuck, I'm not sure what she is, but—"

"She's an AI, Tier. Get a fucking engineer already. I'm not sure why she can eat and sleep and all that human shit, but the fact remains, she was nothing but circuits and electrons back at Junco's place."

I glare at him but he doesn't retract his words. "Say what's on yer mind, Ryse, because I'm losing patience with ya."

"Get a grip on yourself, Tier. Junco's gone, but we're still here. We've got two billion people waiting to disembark the ships, four billion more on their way here, an incomplete Pillar Seven, no Halo, and all you can think about is the health status of that thing you're feeding breakfast to? Esta is fucking gone as well, in case you haven't noticed, Selia is all shot to hell, Ashur's been given control over the Warriors, and now Lucan's back on Amelia waiting to meet seven thousand years of planned retribution. I'm fucking sick of your shit. Pull yourself together."

"Ryse," I start calmly, "Junco's in the fucking Pillar, too, so don't—"

"Yeah, but the whole reason Esta went into the Pillar was because Junco said she'd be fine! She trusted her! I trusted her! Fuck! I trusted you too, and look how fucking far that got me!"

"Look, brother. We're all wound up right now, I get it, but yelling at me isn't gonna make it better. So just calm down."

He walks away, breathing hard, then pivots on his heel and the rage seeps out of his eyes as light. "You're sitting up here with that kid doing what?"

I look outside and see HOUSE watching us through the terrace doors. "Planning, Ryse. She's got a part to play and I'm just trying ta figure—"

"What the fuck are you talking about, Tier? Fuck her! You do realize this fucking baby Junco has put all our potential allies on hold, right?"

I just stare out at HOUSE.

"Fuck it. Forget it, OK? I'll go tell Ashur to call a meeting with the Friendlies up north, because I don't even think you could handle it right now. We're losing, Tier!"

"Wait!" I command before he can leave. "I'll take care of the Friendlies, OK? Tell Ash to go ahead with the migration and I'll take care of the Friendlies. Just give me one more day."

He doesn't even acknowledge me, just ports out and leaves me there feeling sorta stupid but not really caring. I can almost see the pattern here. It's like the whole puzzle is spread out before me, almost making sense, just a few mismatched pieces, just a few that are still askew and don't fit. But it's all right there, I just need to look at it from a new angle or something. Dig a little deeper.

Chapter Nine

"So, tell me again how it happened?"

HOUSE is playing with some dolls that came out of the auto-shopper and I'm kneeling on the floor in front of her. She's told me the story several times now, but it makes no sense.

"No." She scowls at me and goes back to her dolls.

"Subjack—"

"Commander Coot." She corrects me.

"Right." I'm failing to see the difference between the two, but for some reason, this is a point she will not concede. Commander Coot and Subjack are not the same person when she tells this story, even though she does admit they
are
the same person in real life. "Commander Coot reprogrammed your permissions and gave Junco full authority over you when she was ten."

"Almost ten," she corrects again.

"Does it matter, HOUSE? This bullshit with Commander Coot's name and Junco's exact age? Because—"

"You should not talk to me that way."

"Yer making me angry,
girl
."

She goes back to playing.

I close my eyes and ask for patience. "One more time, OK? Junco was given permission and the two of ya discussed you having a holographic body, and then Junco asked ya to make a body, but forgot to add that it should be a holographic one, and then ordered ya to keep it a secret?"

"Yes," she says and then produces a cough so thick with mucus it makes me clear my throat and swallow. Layla's last message said she'd be here in a few hours, and that was more than a few hours ago.

"And yer real? I mean, what's inside ya?" I wait but she doesn't answer. "HOUSE?" No answer. "Is this part of the secret?"

She looks up at me, her eyes all watery with sickness and her face flushed with fever, and nods. "It's a secret."

"Don't you think Junco would want you to tell
me
, though? I mean, she told me to take care of ya, darlin'. And how can I take care of ya if yer sick and ya can't tell me the things I need to make ya better?"

She shrugs and goes back to dressing her dolls, her little fingers deftly pulling on a glittery rhinestone jacket, and then she shoves a pair of pink sunglasses on the doll's face. "I might be able to tell you something else." Her hazel eyes are glowing a bright yellow now, she's lit up like the sun. "I was sick once before." She stops to cough here and it makes me want to choke just listening to it, that's how filled with mucus she is—like her lungs are drowning in it. "Inanna took me to the doctor once. When Junco was very sick," she whispers.

Inanna! "Who?" I ask, my heart beating wildly.

"Inanna." She stops to cough and I wince and shake my head.

She's getting worse by the second and there is no time to figure out why Inanna is involved. "Tell me where she took ya, darlin'."

She stands up suddenly and falls against my chest burying her head, still coughing like crazy. "I don't feel well," she whimpers. "I'm sick again and that means Junco's dying."

Her body goes soft and limp and I have to reposition her so she doesn't slump to the floor. "HOUSE?" Shit. I pull her head back and her eyes are closed. "HOUSE? Tell me, where did Inanna take you?"

I shake her a little and she finally responds with a cough.

"HOUSE?" Dammit! "HOUSE?"

"The Sagitta Building." She breathes out the words in an almost inaudible whisper.

Her coughing takes on a whole new level. I stand up, clutching her close and pacing the floor as the puzzle pieces start to fit into place. Dallas. The Sagitta Building is in Dallas. That's where John Hando took Junco the last time she worked with him. But she told me that it's not really a building, it's a giant transmitter used to send messages into space as well as the home to the only AI duality on the planet.

I locate Annun in another Sargassum building down the beach and transport us to his apartment. He's in the middle of taking a bite out of what might be a peanut butter and jelly sandwich when I scare the shit out of him.

"Whoa! Dude! You—"

He sees HOUSE in my arms, limp and pretty much unconscious, and checks himself.

"I need to see John Hando, right now. We need to get to the Sagitta Building and I know for a fact he's got access."

Annun nods but his eyes are trained on the drooping body in my arms and I see the panic. "Hando, Annun! NOW!"

"Right. I have the compound coordinates, should I—"

I steal them right out of his mind and port the three of us to the Dallas Underbelly.

Chapter Ten

"Which place is his?" I look around and see nothing but lifeless buildings. There are enough hanging trains attached to the underside of Upper Dallas to create a roar of noise and a constant vibration below my boots, but there are no trains above us because most of these old buildings reach up and connect directly to the underbelly. They are awash with filth and the occasional flashing of a half-lit neon sign creates a disturbing vertigo effect. The one across from us says Bail Bonds.

"That one is the main entrance," Annun says as he points to the sign. "They own about twelve city blocks from ground to ceiling. You can't tell from out here, but it's a total military complex inside these buildings."

"How do ya know that?"

He shoots me a dirty look. "It's my fucking job to know, asshole. What do you think I do around here, for fuck's sake?"

I tuck away his insubordination to deal with later. "How do we get in then, genius?" HOUSE stirs in my arms and I lean down to whisper. "Hold on, darlin'. We're almost there."

"We ring the bell." He waits for an oncoming grav bike to pass us and then leads the way across the street. We stop in front of a shoddy gate and Annun pushes a small white button on the side of a box that is affixed to the metal.