Stand Against Infinity by Aaron K. Redshaw Read Free Book Online Page B

he saw the second elevator next to him also headed
up toward them. He waited with U2258 for a few moments and then
stepped back into the other elevator and headed down again.
    “What are we doing?” asked U2258.
    “Again, we are going backwards,” said Samuel.
“One thing people are not good at doing.”
    They hit the bottom floor again and Samuel
and U2258 rushed out onto the street. And there, just around the
corner were six empty cycles.
    This was what Samuel knew best. He pulled out
some wires for the first cycle, yanking them out with a jerk. Then
he did the same for the other three. “Can you ride one of these?”
he asked.
    “I’ve never tried,” said U2258.
    “Well, neither have I, but I’m willing.”
    They turned on the cycles at a press of a
button and they were off. For just a second both of them were a
little unsteady as they got used to the cycles, but as they sped up
they became easier to control. They rode side by side. “You know,”
yelled U2258, “they will call in for more backup.”
    “No, they won’t,” said Samuel. “I disabled
their power. They aren’t going anywhere or calling anyone.”
    U2258 yelled back after a pause, “You would
have made a very efficient criminal.”
    “From now on, we are criminals,” yelled back
Samuel.
     

Chapter 22
    Hirach had lived among the Waldenese for many
years thinking little about those from the city except for when he
saw something like what he was seeing now. Two cycles, generations
more advanced than he had ever seen when he lived in the city
himself, came rushing up toward their settlement. Both stopped in
front of him while he had been going for his daily walk.
    “Come from the city, have you?” asked
Hirach.
    “We would like to join you,” said Samuel.
    “You are welcome to do that,” said Hirach,
“But those cycles are traceable, are they not?”
    Samuel got off the cycle, squatted on the
left of it, and unscrewed a small cap. Then he pulled off a small
blinking device the size of a thimble, threw it on the ground, and
crushed it under his foot. Doing the same to the other cycle, he
said, “Not anymore.”
    “Then come join us,” he said. “We already
have a place you can stay.”
    “Where would that be?” asked Samuel.
    “With me.”
     
    Hirach proved to be an interesting host. He
had grown up in the city, but had moved here with his family when
he was still just a boy. “When I was young I remember the chips,
such as you wear, were only a science fiction. We used to joke
about the many devices we carried and about how someday they might
just embed them into our skulls.”
    After some silence U2258 said, “Well, it’s
not science fiction anymore. And worse is coming.”
    “Worse?” asked Samuel.
    “Yes, they have just developed chips that can
receive information through the airwaves. And on top of that, they
are putting in subliminal messages that will brainwash the wearer
to their way of thinking.”
    “Then a man’s brain will no longer be his
own,” said Hirach. “How sad.”
    “They are choosing their own destruction,”
said Samuel. “I do not feel sorry for them.”
    “Oh?” said U2258. “You do not seem like a man
who can turn off feelings so easily.” Samuel tried his best to
ignore the comment.
     
     
     

Chapter 23
    After a few days, Hirach came to Samuel and
U2258 and said, “I have a better solution for you than to stay with
me. I still enjoy my privacy, though you have been most
entertaining for the time you have been here. But there is a family
I would like you to meet that is set up better for long term
guests.” And that was how they were introduced to Poke, short for
Pocahontas, and Sydney. The couple took them in with no questions
asked. They had no children and they seemed to delight in inviting
those new to the Waldenese to live with them for a while.
    Samuel and U2258 lived there for over a
month, at the end of which U2258 changed his name to Wallace.
     
    One day, Samuel was talking