The Wasteland
Chapter II
"AC", the voice said, and a hand shook her shoulder. Her eyes opened and she saw her father looking at her with grave concern written in his eyes. "AC, we've got to go, honey." He said, gently but urgently.
Suddenly she shot forward as far as the harness would let her, and wrapped her arms around her father with every bit of strength she had. "Oh, Daddy! It was so horrible! I thought I was going crazy.", she wailed into his broad shoulder.
"Yeah, honey, I know." He returned the embrace, rather more gently, and patted her back for a second, before disengaging from the desperate hug. As she released her death grip his hands went to her shoulders and he looked her in the eye. His brown eyes intently gauging hers, the light grasp of his hands on her shoulders tightened slightly, a brief encouragement. "We've got to go." he repeated.
They were indoors now. Apparently they'd made their way there while she was unconscious in the back seat. Unsurprisingly, the dim garage, for that's what it seemed to be, was entirely dirty, gray concrete, without embellishment or decoration; the floor stained and rough, the walls stained and smooth. Large metal doors with a massive steel bar securing them were opposite the standard roll-up garage door behind the moto. Half the LEDs in the room seemed to have failed, explaining the wan light.
Her father was leaning through the open back door, and the dirty old man was scooching past him into the driver's seat. In contrast to her father's handsome features and short dark hair, the old man had tight curls of grey under a cap like her father's, a short but unkempt looking beard, and his face was blocky. The rounded edges of his features made it look like a boulder, smoothed by eons of waves on the ocean shore. He closed the driver's door, and sat there, waiting.
AC pressed the latch on the harness and disengaged it, as her father backed out to allow her egress. She swung her feet out and to the floor and stood, still alarmed at her disenchantment, but greatly relieved to be safely with her dad. He strode to the great metal doors, disengaged the strong bar keeping them secure, and swung first one, then the other fully open. Within, nothing was revealed except a Stygian darkness that caused her to feel uneasy.
Dad walked back to her side and put his arm around her shoulder, walking her towards a stair leading up into darkness in the corner of the garage. After they were clear, the old man, saying nothing, started the moto and drove into the yawning maw of the massive metal doors.
"C'mon honey, let's get you some clothes.", her father said, releasing her shoulder to open the plain metal door at the top of the stair. It was brighter inside, and the light spilled out, warm and yellow. Her father gestured her in, and he closed the door behind them. Several people inside began cheering, rushing up to her and tousling her hair, patting her back, and vigorously congratulating her father, pumping his hand.
She hadn't realized it at first, but this room was unlike others she'd seen since her revelations had begun. The floor was planks of wood, polished with age and scarred, mostly covered by a large oriental carpet, threadbare in parts, but colorful and intricate where yet intact. The people had risen from desks around the large space, where they'd been working at consoles. It took her a moment to realize the photographs on the walls weren't photographs at all, but actual paintings. The walls were panels of wood, glowing with ancient lacquer, polished but worn. The warm light came from individual fixtures, rather than embedded LEDs.
The chatter seemed incomprehensible to her, but at least was clear in it's celebratory tone. "Great job Vick!", a middle-aged blonde woman was saying. "I've never seen better.", said a younger man with short auburn hair - and optics over his eyes. She'd never seen old-fashioned eyeglasses before, and thought they looked uncomfortable. "The Thetas were amazing! I was sure the engrams were going to fail.", he continued.
Two other men contributed similarly congratulatory, but cryptic, statements. One was rather stout, with black hair, and one tail of his shirt untucked under his sweater, while the other wore a plaid, short-sleeved shirt with a strange device in the sole pocket. Some kind of analog measuring device, was her best guess. His hair was a fiery red. They introduced themselves between praises and cheers, but the seemingly eternal cognitive dissonance left her with no recollection of their names. She huddled into her sheet resolutely, hoping for clarity and understanding to wash away the confusion and alarm of the day's events.
Her father let the accolades continue for but a minute, before raising his hand, and commanding their attention.
"This is great, folks, but we've gotta get AC some clothes..." Before he could even finish, the blonde woman turned to AC and steered her towards another room. "We'll get you fixed up honey. I'm Mabel. You were amazing! Your daddy and us, we've been getting ready for this day for a long time, and you just made it easy." As she spoke, she moved efficiently and herded AC along with confidence that assuaged any questions AC might have had about going with a stranger. Somehow, AC never even considered whether or not to go with her. Her confidence and matter of fact attitude just assumed all was well, and AC was happy to just let that feeling wash over her.
After they entered the bedroom, Mabel shut the door, and continued on to another door, which she opened to reveal a bathroom. Although all the appointments in both rooms were archaic, even ancient, they were clean - and real, rather than illusions, as her own room had turned out to be.
"You just make yourself at home, and clean up, use the facilities, whatever you need." Mabel strode to a dresser and opened the top drawer. "Some of this stuff will fit you, I'm sure, and you'll have to sort through it to see." Mabel never stopped her constant motion, and her hands pulled various items from the lingerie and socks in the drawer, and dropped them back in without pause.
AC was happy to note that none of it seemed to be made of burlap. It occurred to her to momentarily wonder why her father and the crusty old man had both been dressed in the kinds of rags she'd discovered she'd been wearing when she got the first look at the real world.
Mabel turned and went to a set of double bi-fold doors of unfinished wood across from the dresser, and opened them both wide, revealing a closet stuffed with clothing, from dresses, robes, blouses, and even suit jackets and dress pants, to swimsuits and raincoats, all jammed into too little space. "You just take what you need, and get yourself comfy." She briefly gestured at the closet, and bathroom in turn, and then returned to the door through which they had entered, before finally, pausing in her tracks, with her hand on the doorknob.
AC hadn't moved a muscle since they'd entered the room and Mabel had stopped herding her. Mabel strode purposefully back over to her and enveloped her in a matronly hug, which took AC by surprise, but didn't seem untoward. "Oh, honey, you've made your father so proud of you. If you only knew! We're all very happy for you too. I know you're shocked and full of questions, and we'll answer every one, just as soon as you're ready."
Mabel quit squishing her, and stood back, holding AC at arms length, her grey-blue eyes piercing, but not challenging. "Is there anything special you need?" Mabel asked.
"Uh, no, I don't, uh, think..." AC said, really unable to think about anything she'd need; unable to think of what she'd lost; unable to think much at all, yet, tumbling along in the chaotic flow of incomprehensible events.
"Well, you just get dressed, then, and come out when you are good and ready." Without another pause, Mabel strode to the door, and slipped out, closing it behind her.
Alone in the quiet room, AC tried to absorb what had happened to her in the last.. Geezus! It probably wasn't even two hours ago she'd pried the lenses from her eyes! The whole world was utterly morphed. Sally, Jessie, Izzy, Bart.. how could she describe to them what had happened? Would she ever even talk to them again?
Suddenly she missed her sweet, boring friends with all of her heart, and she felt her lip quiver. She missed her boredom, her sense of being the daring rebellious one, of her peers. She missed their snark, and their...
Were they even real??? She turned and sat on the edge of the bed, thinking. Nothing had been real. Her room, her vanity, the park, even her dad had been a robot in the living room! But daddy was real here, real now, and that was good. How could she even know if her friends had been real, or might have been robots...
She was so confused!
Realizing the only way she could figure anything out was by getting dressed and asking some questions, she turned to the dresser to find some small clothes. She was determined now to get to the bottom of all the mysteries that had suddenly replaced all the surety and ground rules she'd ever known. A frown furrowed her brow, and the same fortitude that had enabled her to pry loose the second prosthetic lens even through the agony of the first welled up within her as she picked through the panties and socks in the drawer.
She was not a fool, but she had been fooled all her life.
Never again! She swore in her heart to get to the truth, and never let it go again.
