the shock of impact, stopped his heart.
Less than a mile away, the executive office of the Boylston Street headquarters of NMech echoed with twin horrified cries. Marta and Dana heard Jim’s parting words, a collision, a roar and then the sound of shattering glass. Before they could comprehend the sequence, they heard the whoomp of flesh striking pavement. Then silence.
Marta slumped to the floor. Her breath came in short gasps. “Oh no. No, no, no, no…” Dana came to his mother’s side and held her. He opened his mouth and clenched his eyes shut, and uttered a wail of grief as he pulled his mother even tighter. She turned and held the child to her breast. Their anguish was heart-wrenching. NMech employees rushed into Eva’s office and found mother and child locked in an agonized embrace.
“What is it? What happened?” one of them cried. “What?”
“Jim… Jim… Jim…” Her words tapered off into inchoate cries of despair.
“What happened?”
Their only response was convulsive sobs.
30
RECOVERY
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS
MARCH 4, 2045
Marta clung to Dana like a shipwreaked sailor might cling to a a rock. She turned to him and brushed a lock of hair out of his face and wiped tears from his cheek. She kissed his forehead, sobbed again, and then caught hold of herself. She struggled to regain her composure.
“We have to figure out how Eva started this,” she said.
“But there’s nothing here. What are we missing?” Dana asked.
Marta’s self-control cracked. “You mean besides everything that Eva destroyed? Besides that your father is dead? And probably mine? Other than that?” Now her voice was near hysteria. “If there’s some way to stop this disaster, she hid it too well.”
Dana’s head snapped up in sudden realization. “Hidden? Mom, I think I can find the key to Eva’s programming. Something she told me a long time ago about hiding things in plain sight. Come on, we’ve got to do this and then we can, well, whatever. Where is there a nanoscale microscope?”
Marta lumbered to her feet. She teetered and fell back. She grabbed for the edge of the desk but missed. She collapsed.
“Mom? Mom? Mom!” Dana reached down and touched the side of her neck. Her pulse was thready, her skin cold and clammy, her breathing shallow. Dana cradled her head in his lap and called out, “Somebody help! We need help! Link to Emergency Services. Please.”
Several NMech personnel rushed in and found Marta, prone, legs sprawled open, as if welcoming death as her lover. Dana knelt beside her and stroked her hair and face. His face was a map of fatigue and grief.
“What’s wrong?” a woman asked.
“Link to Emergency Services. Now.”
“Dana, they’re all out on emergency calls. Do you know what’s going on out there?”
“Listen,” Dana said to the woman. He subvocalized a holo display, inviting her to look. “Do you see what I’m prepared to send you? I’ll give you her doctor’s cloud data. Get hold of her doctor and get him here
The woman took in the sum, ready to be transmitted. Her eyes widened for a moment and then fixed on Dana. Her voice was gentle. “Dana, there’s nobody to reach. The city is under martial law. Most of the country is. All medical personnel are at hospitals or with ambulances. I would do anything for your mother. But it’s impossible.”
Dana groaned. His cry built to a banshee’s wail.
A researcher at NMech burst through the door, a physician before joining NMech. “What’s going on? What happened to Dr. Cruz?”
Dana summarized crisply, “She’s thirty-six years old, severe JRA, and having an attack of MAS.” Then his voice cracked, “Please help my mom.”
“Okay, son. Let’s see what we have.” His voice was calm. Before Dana could move away, Marta reached with one hand and clutched his wrist. Though weakened, her grasp was enough to hold him fast. Dana bent down and put his ear to her mouth.
“Go…stop Eva. Nanoscope in my workspace. I love you, son, with all my heart, with all my soul, and with all my might.”
“Mom, you’re going to be all right. Hold on. The doctor’s here.”
“Dana. Listen to me. You must go to El Yunque. Find Abuela. She’ll know what to do.”
“Mom, don’t talk like that. You’re going to be okay.”
Dr. Marta Cruz, bohique and researcher, mother and widow, the scientist credited with ending the Great Washout—or helping to start it, depending on the account—summoned her last reserve of strength. “Hijo! Promise me. Whatever happens, you must go to El Yunque. Promise me!”
Tears streamed down his cheeks. He bent down and embraced her. “Oh, Mama. I promise. But you have to promise me that you will live.”
Marta smiled. “I promise that I will love you always and my spirit will look after you.” She let go of his wrist and reached behind her neck. Clumsy fingers unfastened a string that held a small leather pouch to her breast.
“Dana, take this. You will find someone to wear it. Abuela can teach her, too.” Softly now, “Go to Abuela.”
Dana stared at his mother’s leather pouch. Marta’s voice trailed off, unintelligible now, a series of moans. She was semi-conscious. And then, silent.
The doctor pushed Dana out of the way, ripped apart Marta’s shirt and applied medical cloth to help regulate her vitals, a vain gesture that would do little more than rob the body of its modesty. Dana turned his eyes away from the sight of his mother’s torso. Too cheerful sunlight streamed in through the window, and reflected off the dull surfaces of Eva’s furniture. The shadow cast a gray pallor on Marta’s slack face. The color of life was gone.
31
MY MOTHER
FROM THE MEMORIES
OF DANA ECCO
Imagine waking up every day with a stiff neck, unable to turn your head to the left or to the right. Imagine your back, legs, arms, hands, and hips, as stiff as a rubber toy left overnight in a snow bank. That was my mother’s every morning.
She never complained.
What would you do if your wrists, knees, spine, shoulders, jaw, and ankles were swollen, hot, and tender? Your fingers puffed at each knuckle? Would you cry out? Seek the comfort of human sympathy?
My mother did not complain.
How about the fevers, aches, and fatigue? “Ah,” you would say, “That I can bear. I’d force fluids, nip some
