Robogenesis: A Novel

3. TORCH


Post New War: 3 Months, 10 Days

For weeks, the George Washington Bridge was crowded with refugees coming home to New York City from the countryside. Satellite estimates put it at a hundred thousand returning, along with all their portable shelters, cooking equipment, and domesticated animals. Most of them were part of “the Tribe,” a growing complex of cooperating gangs spread across the eastern United States. One strongman was in charge of the entire Tribe, a former narco-trafficker named Felix Morales. Without fear or pity, Felix was the kind of man who was not afraid to make a deal with the devil. In other words, he was my kind of man.

—ARAYT SHAH


NEURONAL ID: NOLAN PEREZ

We’re running, hand in hand. Mathilda’s fingers are braided into mine. The word Mommy is still on my lips, hot tears blurring my eyes. But my big sister is pulling me away, my lungs aching, away from where Mommy is screaming through the fence, away from danger, toward safety. These are the strongest memories that I have of my sister, of my life—memories of running away.

Every night, these are my dreams.

Mathilda and I used to run from machines. Hard bits of metal that waited in the cold night, ready to tear into soft warm children. But lately, things have changed in New York City. Instead of running from crouching lumps of metal and plastic, my sister and I are running from other survivors.

The Tribe is here now.

I don’t know what happened to the gaunt people who left the city for the woods. The war lasted three years. Three scorching summers and three freezing winters. Years of Rob changing, sharpening its new babies into more and more deadly shapes. All the familiar cars and airplanes I remember from before rusted away slow and then came back fast as clawing walkers and swarms of corkscrew drones.

I’m surprised anybody can still recognize New York City.

Vines and weed trees were growing in every dirty crevice of Manhattan by the time Mathilda and I even found the Underground. All the pipes burst forever ago. Without pumps, most subways flooded and a lot of roads caved into sinkholes or turned to creeks. A couple of years later, the creepers and wild grass had taken hold pretty much everywhere you looked. It’s okay. We used the leaves as camouflage. We let the birds and raccoons and feral cats distract the machines with their heat signatures.

And anything that nature didn’t take fast enough we blew up or knocked over ourselves. Those first machines had wheels. Our friends Marcus and Dawn told us to break the roads, buildings, and sidewalks. It slowed the machines down enough so we could survive, and it was fun as hell. Late-war varieties either had legs or they flew, but still, nothing here is flat or clean or even. All the hard edges of brick and steel and glass are rusting or crumbling or mossy. All of it is thick with years of quick-growing vines.

The city has changed. And I guess these people have changed, too.

Like always, I watch from a distance. The Tribe is mostly made up of skinny guys and girls with lean muscles. They wear patched-together clothes, all faded to the same skin-brown color. Brown teeth and leathery skin. They keep watch on each other out of the corners of their eyes. Their dirty hands are always out, tense, fingers ready to turn into fists.

They are survivors and they have had to fight machines and other people, too. It shows in how far they stand from each other. The way they orient their little tarp shelters. It’s in the bulge of hidden weapons carried by all of them, even the kids. And it especially shows up in how pure they are. Sweaty and greasy and just plain filthy, but all made of flesh, through and through.

They have to be pure—the Tribe kills modified humans on sight.

Modified humans like my sister. Or her boyfriend, Thomas. All three of us stayed here as long as we could. We thought maybe the waves of refugees would stop. But they didn’t. The city filled up more and more until not even the Underground’s tunnels were safe. Streams of hungry, angry people were coming right into our home. Now they sleep and fight and trade on streets that used to be death to set foot on.

I hate that the bad guys look like us. They eat what we eat. Breathe the same air. It took a couple of months, but now I’m figuring out that these yellow-eyed scavengers are going to catch us and kill us sooner or later.

So today is the day, whether I agree or not.

Mathilda led me down here to our most secret place. Our first place. This is the subway tunnel where the fighters brought my sister and me when we washed up in New York City. This is where Mathilda used the autodoc to fix me when I was hurt with shrapnel. Over the years, she used it again and again to keep me strong. And this is also where she met him.

Thomas is on his knees across the room, rolling supplies up in a tarp. The girls say he’s handsome. He is half Mexican, a solid build with dark black hair and hazel eyes. He uses only his right hand, bundling the tarp. His left is placed flat on the ground. The industrial scissors where his fingers should be are glinting, lightly scraping the concrete. He was modified in the Rob work camps, like my sister.

But he is nothing like my sister.

“Are you sure, Mathilda?” I’m asking, quietly. She is watching Thomas with her mouth open a little bit. It’s about as dreamy a look as she can get, with no eyes. His scissor hand doesn’t bother her. She told me that Thomas’s blades are more real to her than his natural skin. Mathilda sees the muscle patterns under the flesh. She watches people manipulate the meat on their faces into different expressions. Smiles and frowns, it’s all the same to Mathilda. It’s just meat.

Right now, Thomas is frowning up at me.

“Look, Nolan,” he says. “Now is our only chance to make it across the bridge. We tried waiting but it’s getting worse every day. More people, more eyes.”

“We could swim across the river,” I mutter, but Thomas just glances at me like I’m an idiot.

We both know that swimming across the river is next to impossible. Early on in the New War, stumpers started hiding around the city. The explosives would come scuttling out if you got too close. They’d blow people to pieces. Big, screaming pieces. It wasn’t until late in the war that we realized some of them had evolved to swim.

Dumb and mute now, the water roaches are still bobbing on the river waves by the thousands. Little mossy blobs, covered in algae and bleached pale on top by the sun. They can still latch and detonate. Not even good for scavenge.

Mathilda turns her head in her special way. When she points her chin to the ground like this, it means that she is pushing her eyes out of this room. Listening to the heartbeat of the outside world. Talking back to it, sometimes.

Six months ago, I pretended to be asleep and watched her make that same face. From my pallet, I saw her stare into space and whisper to someone called Nine Oh Two. She had an antenna cord in one hand and her head cocked to the side, just like this. I didn’t know it at the time, and nobody else knows it now, but I think that night I was watching my sister win the New War.


“The water is still too dangerous. And there are watchers posted on the bridges,” Mathilda says. “I can hear them checking in with each other. They’re looking for us. Felix Morales is offering rewards for every modified killed.”

Her lip quivers and she bites it.

“What else?” I ask. “What else did you see?”

“Somebody . . . I don’t know. Someone that communicates like Big Rob used to. That orange light in the sky. Whispers that fall into people’s ears. Into their minds. It has a name . . . Arayt . . . ?” she trails off, whispering.

“See?” says Thomas. “We gotta get out of here now.”

“You’re right that we waited too long,” I say, trying to think of anything to defy Thomas. “The north is barricaded. But we should make a raft or steal a boat or something. Go right out into the bay.”

Thomas angrily tightens a pair of straps around the tarp. Picks it up and slings it over his shoulder. All our possessions.

“And what if they’re watching the water? We’ll be floating, helpless. Why won’t you just trust me?” he asks. “This is going to work. It will be dark soon. We’ll take the tunnel and use other people as camouflage. With the shadows, nobody on the street will notice her eyes.”

It’s a terrible plan. But I’m not the one who is supposed to make these decisions. I’ve always had someone to keep me safe.

“Are you sure?” I ask Mathilda.

She pauses, watching Thomas. Finally, she sighs. “I don’t have a better plan, Nolan. It’s too dangerous to split up.”

“I just don’t think it’s safe,” I mutter.

Thomas steps between my sister and me. He slides his good arm tight around her shoulders. Then he turns and glares at me.

“You think you’re safe right now? Dude, you’re not even fourteen years old. I don’t think you understand that not all people are good. Plenty of your Underground friends are willing to sell us out to the Tribe.”

“No, they wouldn’t . . . ,” I say, trailing off.

I can throw a rock through the window of a ten-story skyscraper, but my voice sounds high-pitched and childish in my ears.

“You don’t have to come with us, you know,” Thomas says, holding up his scissors. His other arm is still around my sister. Mathilda regards me emotionlessly with her black facets, as hard to read as always.

“Thomas,” she says, but he squeezes his arm around her and she leans her head against his shoulder. I wonder if she is relieved to have someone she can depend on. Instead of someone she always has to take care of.

“He has to hear this,” says Thomas, kissing Mathilda’s hair. He looks over at me, eyes narrow, scissors glinting. “You could stay here if you wanted, Nolan. You could join the Tribe and become a part of this place. You’re normal, not like us. Hear me? You’re not like us. Don’t forget it.”

Mathilda has a bandage wrapped around her face, covering her eyes. It is tan and stretchy and she says that she can see right through it. She also says she can see my heart beating in my chest. I believe her.

Thomas has on an army jacket with sleeves that go past his scissor hand. The scissor blade is wrapped in a bandage. It’s hard to notice anyway. He’s always had the habit of keeping his damaged hand hidden—even before the Tribe showed up. It’s a quiet, subconscious kind of magic trick that is always happening with him.

I would guess that he’s ashamed of it. But what do I know? I’m not like them, as Thomas pointed out. So it’s up to me to lead the way.

“Straight to the Lincoln Tunnel,” says Thomas, grabbing the back of my elbow with his good hand. He pushes me.

“I heard you already. Geez,” I respond, shaking him off.

We’re in what used to be called Times Square. It was a special part of Old Manhattan. Now it’s a patchy meadow over a broken asphalt street, surrounded by creaking skyscrapers that are turning green and brown with moss and vines and creepers. Up high, the steel and glass walls are stained in streaky waterfalls of rain and soot. The ring of buildings seems to shiver as a chilly breeze sweeps in and ruffles the carpet of leaves growing on their bellies. It won’t be safe down here for much longer, not in the shadows of these leaning dinosaur bones.

We walk through fading dusk, staying close together and avoiding eye contact with strangers who pass by. The Lincoln Tunnel is only a mile southwest of here. The newcomers have cut paths in the grass from the central walkway to nearby buildings. Shattered windows breathe smoke from cooking fires inside; suspicious eyes are on us.

A few months ago, we’d have attracted a dozen types of Rob just walking out here unprotected. The empty buildings were only good for putting distance between the burrowing varieties of Rob and our tunnels. Quadruped runners used to climb four or five stories and make camouflaged nests on windowsills, waiting to leap down at any sign of movement. I still can’t stop myself from constantly scanning the thick brush and empty window sockets.

Ahead, I see a knot of thin faces. Eyes flashing. I steer us toward an overgrown side street. Thomas tries to grab my elbow but I throw my arms out. “Scavenge?” I ask to a group of people huddled next to a building. “I’ll give metal for pelts. Metal for pelts.”

They turn away. I don’t have to worry about people wanting metal. There’s plenty of that to be had. Too much.

After we’ve avoided the watchers, Thomas pushes me back on track. “No more detours,” he whispers at my back.

After another few minutes, I reach a hand back for Mathilda.

“You okay?” I ask. The tall buildings are thinning out now that we’re almost to the Hudson. The tunnel is only a half mile south of here and I’m getting scared.

“She’s fine,” says Thomas.

The tarp full of supplies clinks with each step he takes. I hear him murmuring to Mathilda but can’t make out the words. In the last nine months, I have never been able to figure out why my sister likes this guy. He isn’t especially nice. He doesn’t seem very thoughtful. He’s strong, but all the survivors are.

All I can tell is that sometimes he picks her up. Cradles her like a little girl and spins her around. They go on walks together. And sometimes he holds his head a little sideways and grins at her crooked and says something mean.

I’ll never understand her.

That rough hand is on my elbow again. “Through there,” says Thomas, urging me toward a blasted-out doorway just beyond a tangled field. It’s a small building in the shadow of a thirty-story skyscraper. Gnats flitter through dim sunlight over high grass. Even now, we stay away from the really wild places. Dumb machines are still hunting out there, lost in the woods without their master.

“Why this way?” I ask. “The tunnel is over there.”

Thomas doesn’t say anything. He just shoves me as we cross the field. That steady clink-clink comes from the bag behind me, urging me ahead. It’s starting to feel ominous now.

I step through the doorway, rubbing my arm. It’s dark inside and the checkerboard floor is covered in dirt and wilted yellow grass.

The clinking sound stops.

“Thomas?” I ask, turning.

The combined silhouette of Thomas and Mathilda stands in the empty door frame. Red sunlight is streaming down behind them, really gentle, picking out the flight of bugs and floating wisps of cottonwood. It’s pretty, but a dead fear is building in my chest.


Something is wrong.

“Guys?” I ask.

My eyes are adjusting to the light. Now I see the two men standing on either side of the door I just walked through. Both are shorter than me. Lean and strong, with dirt-stained faces and wolf smiles. They wear looted designer jeans and jackets.

The Tribe.

“Damn, you’re a big one, aren’t ya?” says one of them. The other one is leaning forward, his arm moving quick in the twilight. By the time I understand, it’s too late to react. The metal pipe connects hard against my left knee.

“Nolan?” shouts Mathilda.

A starburst of pain blossoms in my leg and I fall onto the dirt-covered linoleum floor. Mathilda’s screams come from outside. Her shadow is on the ground in front of my face. It separates from Thomas and now she is struggling, twisting and scratching to get away from the man in the doorway.

And to get away from Thomas.

Another shadow flickers toward my face. I roll onto my back as the metal bar thuds into the ground next to my head. I reach out and grab it, pulling the skinny man down on top of me. It is surprisingly easy.

“Little help!” he shouts. His cheeks are scarred with acne and his breath reeks like alcohol. Mathilda screams again, a short, hurt yelp that puts a burst of adrenaline into my legs and arms. I grab the pipe in both hands and kick the squirming man off me. He bounces against the wall and crumples with a surprised grunt.

I scramble up in time to catch a fist in my mouth.

I take it and keep staggering forward, spitting blood. With all my momentum, I knock Thomas away from Mathilda. Both of us hit the ground in a heap.

My sister staggers into the street, free.

“Run,” I say, as someone clamps a hand onto the back of my shirt. I’m on all fours now, crawling forward with somebody tugging on my back. The metal pipe is still clenched in my fist.

Mathilda reaches for me, instead of taking off. She has her forehead creased in that stubborn way she has. The flat black sockets of her eyes don’t project any emotion and I wonder again what she sees. Whether she could have seen this coming.

“I’ll catch up,” I say, climbing to my feet. I’m holding the metal bar low, arm trapped against my side. I stagger forward another step. I’m dragging Thomas and whoever-it-is behind me and they are clawing, trying to pull me down.

I plant my free palm on Mathilda’s chest and push. She staggers back.

“Run!” I shout.

The shove snaps her out of it. We are brother and sister but we haven’t hit each other since the war started. Mathilda turns away and scrabbles for the building across the street.

Only now do I move the bar out from in front of my knee. Keeping the metal there was the only way for her not to see. If she knew my leg was sliced open and bleeding, she never would have left me. The pain of that last step has put a cold sweat on my forehead and goosebumps on the backs of my arms. I’m panting like a dog now and I can feel my heartbeat pounding in the back of my throat making me want to throw up.

Someone has an arm wrapped around my neck, pulling.

I have one last chance. I spin in place, throwing the person behind me off balance. I’m swinging the heavy metal pipe as hard as I can. A flash of pain from my knee bolts up my leg and comes out of my mouth as a scream. But the bar connects. Hard. It makes a sound like hitting a home run.

Ding.

The Tribe member behind me drops.

And my knee gives out. I hit the ground again, on my stomach this time, metal bar singing against a curb as it bounces away. Thomas lands with his knee on my back, presses my face into the dirt with his forearm. I see Mathilda duck into a squat brick building across the street. It’s a hidey-hole, but a dead end. There is no other way out, no other buildings near it. A bad place.

And the sun is setting now.

“Ah, shit,” says the acne-scarred guy at the doorway. I hear Thomas puke and cold spatters against my cheek. The pain in my leg is rising like floodwater, drowning me. In flashes, I see Thomas wiping his mouth. Another guy lies still with a dent in the side of his shaved head. Something pink is dribbling out of the hole. The man at the door is grinning down at me and shaking his head.

“She’s gone,” says Thomas. “And I’m not going into that death trap. How are we supposed to flush her out?”

“First get the cuffs on the farm boy here,” says the scarred man. “Raise Felix on the radio and tell him about his primo. And drag the kid over to watch this.”

I fade out.

Somebody is giggling in the dark. I can smell pure alcohol. A couple of men rush past me with metal cans. Something sloshing inside. My mind is swimming and my eyes won’t focus. What seems like seconds later, I hear the first flames.

I open my eyes.

Smoke clouds a crisp moon. A rind of flame chews on the base of the brick building. Dark figures lurch around in the night. There is no way out of there. My sister is inside and these cackling monsters are setting the whole thing on fire.

“Mathilda?” I mutter.

The building roars as a wall of flame climbs its side. The leafy vines and creepers are turning into veins of light. Higher up, I hear leftover windows shattering from the heat. The shards make a pretty sound as they tinkle down onto the pavement.

“Damn,” says somebody. “We gonna have to get back.”

“For real?” asks somebody else. His voice is a sandpaper murmur under the chuckling flames.

“Get back, now,” comes a shout. “It’s going!” And now hands are under my armpits. Dragging me through cool grass with the heat of that flaming building pressing against my face. Cold darkness tongues the nape of my neck as the flames press in.

“She’s coming down!”

The excited shouts are lost now in a falling stream of wreckage. Chunks of the building are dropping, hitting the ground like meteor impacts. Spraying shards of rock and buckling the concrete sidewalk. I’m kicking with my good leg, heel digging into the dirt. Bucking and wriggling, trying to get away.

“My sister’s in there,” I’m moaning. I can’t hear my own voice over the splitting beams and crashing sections of brick facade. The whole building is swaying, falling apart and sending embers roiling up into the sky.

“Mathilda!” I scream. Or I think I’m screaming it. My voice is only a vibration in my chest. The collapse seems to last forever. Dust and ash and sparks escaping into the sky. But it ends. Like all things.

The grass is freezing and wet on my back. Dark sky above and a lump of smoking wreckage that radiates heat like a dark sun. My tears are tracing cold paths down my temples. My hands are crossed over my stomach, wrists burning from handcuffs.

“. . . kid is friggin’ heavy.”

“. . . thing went up like a firecracker.”

“. . . see what he did to Felix’s little cousin?”

Blinking away tears, I strain my neck to look up. Thomas and four or five members of the Tribe are standing in a circle around me. They smoke handmade cigarettes and pass around a bottle. The scarred one looks down at me.

“You killed the wrong guy, kid,” he says, and light from the smoldering building is flickering on his disfigured cheeks.

“Killed?” I ask.

“Put a f*cking hole in his head,” says an anorexic-looking guy. His bony arms are crossed over each other for warmth. He rubs his shoulders. “Dead before he hit the ground.”

“Boss man,” says the guy with the scar, alerting the others.

A dark form appears, backlit by the glowing mound of rubble. It’s a compact man, face hidden in shadow. Two others are around him, maybe more. The shape squats over the man I killed. Reaches out and puts a palm over the face, closing his eyes.


“éste lo hizo?” asks a low voice in Spanish.

“Yeah, this is the kid,” replies the scarred man.

It is silent and dark for a long second.

“Put him in the hole,” says the dark shape, standing.

“You got it, Felix.”

This dark shape is the leader of the Tribe. The one responsible for all this. In the shadows, he turns his head to the side and stops at a precise angle. Even in silhouette, the pose reminds me instantly of Mathilda. The way my sister would push her eyes out into the world, seeing more than what was there. It’s like meeting somebody with a familiar tic. After a second or two he looks back up.

“It’s time for you to leave, muchacho,” Felix says. “Los saltamontes will be all over this place soon. You know how they love the heat.”

“Yes, sir.”

The shadow turns to leave.

“Mr. Morales,” says a familiar voice, “it’s . . . it’s an honor to meet you, sir.”

Thomas. The reality of what’s happened is coming into focus now. This is the killer who betrayed my sister. Who saw to it that she burned alive. My sister is dead. Knowing it is breaking everything inside me. Shattered machinery is still moving and hurting itself more and I can’t make it stop.

The building came down. There was no way out.

“He’s a modified,” I croak, sitting up. Wrists bound together, I shrug my shoulder across my leaking eyes and smear snot and tears across my face. “Thomas is modified. Check his hand. Look at his left hand, because he hasn’t got one. It’s just a pair of f*cking Rob scissors.”

Felix and the scarred man turn to look at Thomas. He is backing away, step by step. As their eyes settle, he stops moving.

“He’s full of shit,” he says. But the sleeves of his army coat still hang over his hands. He puts his arms out to his sides in an I-have-nothing-to-hide gesture.

“You Rob-made? Let’s see, Tomás,” says Felix.

Thomas looks down at me, a flurry of expressions crossing his face: anger and despair and sadness, like a trapped animal. And then he smiles.

“Sorry, Nolan,” says Thomas.

He does a little flourish and lifts his arms so that his coat sleeves fall back to his forearms. His right hand is open, fingers splayed. But his left hand, where the scissors were, is just a bandage-covered stump. I try to think of the last time I saw his scissors and I can’t remember. He must have used the autodoc and then a bandage to hold them in place to trick Mathilda’s eyes.

“I did lose a hand in the war, but I’m not modified,” he says. “And I gave you the girl. So I’m a citizen now, right?”

I’m staring at his stump, lip quivering. Thomas had this planned. He knew all along what he was going to do to us.

“You cut it off?” I ask, and my voice is small. “Then you kept it in your sleeve to fool Mathilda. That’s not fair. It was a machine. He cut it off!”

It’s no use. Telling won’t help. Now I must try to live.

“Deal’s a deal,” says Felix, and he walks away.

The man with the scar shakes his head at me. Digs out a piece of paper, some kind of Tribe citizenship card, and hands it to Thomas. After inspecting the card, Thomas lifts it up and mock salutes the men with it. Tucks it into his pocket and turns to leave.

“Long live the Tribe,” he says.

My eyes are squeezed shut now and I can feel my heart full of broken parts. Every thought slices deeper. I hear snatches of my mom’s voice. She is the only sister you will ever have.

Thomas squats next to me, elbows over his knees.

“Welcome to the new world,” he whispers. “I tried to tell you, kid. Not everybody is good.”