Take the All-Mart!

CHAPTER 18: JACKED





Trip jacked into nothingness.

Not blindness, just pure, featureless white. Stretching out forever and ever.

Trip’s avatar stood naked at the center of infinity.

It wouldn’t have been so bad, but he was alone. And it was cold. And he didn’t have any cigs.

He wheeled around on his heel and saw... nothing. “Okay, this was probably a mistake,” he said to the nothingness on his third spin.

“You haven’t lowered your firewall, Trip.”

The voice came from nowhere and everywhere. It wasn’t Roxanne’s, but then again, it wasn’t not Roxanne’s.

Trip huffed. “Why bother having it if I’m not going to use it? Let me guess. The All-Mind, right? Where’s Roxanne?”

“She’s in here with me. Lower your firewall and join us.”

“Much as I love threesomes, you’ve got no body, and Roxanne’s in no position to say yes and mean it.”

“A body can be arranged, if that would make you more comfortable.” The voice was suddenly just behind his ear. “But I agree. We don’t need her.”

Trip turned towards the voice. He was still surrounded by nothing. “Speak for yourself.”

“I’m not going to hurt her. I’m not going to hurt any of you.”

“So I should feel free to ignore the death threat and jack out then?”

“I’m sorry about that. I just wanted to talk to you.”

“Talk? About what?”

“Our future, of course.”

“Our future? We have a future?”

The All-Mind’s voice became a whisper in his ear. “You do want to rule the world, don’t you?”





Trip plucked the jack from his neck, blinked as cyberspace faded and his eyes cleared, Roxanne in his lap, for all the world sleeping peacefully. The filigree of blue webbing was still there in her eyelids, but fading rapidly.

“So?” Rudy asked, twisted around in the front seat and gawking at Trip, passing a half-empty jug of beer to Bernice. His lips were smeared with dark red. Lipstick.

Trip lifted Roxanne off his lap and sat her up, gently laying her head against the back window and taking the jack out from behind her ear. “So,” Trip said, pushing on the back of the driver’s seat with his knees, “I’m getting out.”

“What?” Rudy opened the driver’s door and got out. “Why?”

Trip coiled the patch cord around his fist, then pushed his way out of the Wound. Once he was out, he bent down to smirk at Bernice in the passenger seat. He thumbed at Roxanne. “When she comes to, tell her we’ll always have her bedroom, and that I’m expecting some kind of monument be erected in my honor for rescuing her. Maybe in that town square — get rid of that awful junk fountain. Nothing flashy, though. Fifty foot tall and solid gold will do.”

“What are you talking about?” Rudy asked.

Trip pocketed the patch cord and reached into the Wound to stab a few buttons on the GameGear. The trunk popped open. Trip stood up, gave Rudy a fox-in-the-henhouse grin. “Yeah, looks like the All-Mind wants to hook up and take over the world with me, so I’m going back.”

Rudy shrugged. “You not taking the car, are you?”

“Nice,” Trip said before walking back to the trunk, where he grabbed the kinked and knotted bundle of rope Hunt-R used as a pillow and stuffed it under the crook of his arm. “Real nice. That all you have to ask?”

Rudy was already back in the driver’s seat. His hands hovered over the steering wheel for a second, then snapped onto it. He let out a long, happy sigh. “If you’re not taking the car, then, don’t really need any details, do I?”

Trip slammed the driver’s door closed. “I’d invite you along, but honestly, you’ve been cramping my style lately. Besides, you stick around her, I’m pretty sure Cleavage there is going to f*ck your brains out at some point.”

Rudy flushed. “Really?”

Bernice slid up next to him, slipped her hand under his t-shirt. “Chances are pretty good, yeah.” She looked out at Trip. “What about Rox? She’s still got those nanochines running around in her, right?”

“The All-Mind’s deactivating them. Roxanne’ll be fine once she wakes up. All of you will be.” Trip took out his tin of cigs. One left. Usually he’d save the last one for an emergency, but he was standing on the roof of his own personal department store, now. Getting more wouldn’t be a problem, he suspected. He lit up. “Just keep driving east ‘till you run out of roof, then the All-Mind will whip up a ramp. You time it right, you’ll hit the ground just in time to meet up with the rest of the little wasteland cult you hang with. Roxanne wasn’t lying about that, they’re being freed.” Trip smirked down at Rudy. “Well, guess this is —”

“Yep, sure is.” Rudy cut him off. He slipped the Wound into drive and hit the gas. “Watch your feet!”

Trip watched the Wound speed away across the rooftop until it sideswiped a solar panel and it just became too painful to watch. “Sorry, girl,” he said to the air.

He grabbed the rope from under his arm and walked to the edge of the hole in the roof, peered down.

Thirty feet below, a ring of Security zombies waited patiently for him.