Epoch Earth; the Great Glitch

  EPOCH EARTH;

  THE GREAT GLITCH

  Book One

  of the

  Great Glitch Series

  Toasha Jiordano

  Copyright © year Toasha Jiordano

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN:

  ISBN-13:

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Epoch Earth; The Great Glitch

  Part I: The Glitch

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Part II: One Month AG

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Part III: Six Months AG

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Part IV: Ten Months AG

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Chapter Fifty-One

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  This book is dedicated to my children, husband, and my mom... not always in that order.

  Part I: The Glitch

  Chapter One

  I was thirteen the first time I saw someone glitch out and die.

  The man barged in the dining room right behind me as I stood there not setting the table, mentally cussing the stupid dress my mom had forced me to wear. He pushed past me and knocked the cups from my hand. They shattered on the hardwood floor and my silent curses shifted to him.

  He clawed behind his ear. An acrid burning flesh stench filled the room. It sizzled, calling to mind a juicy steak at first, but quickly turned foul. Like a dog, I huffed hard out of my nose to push the stench from my head.

  Tears and spit ran down his face as he fell to his knees. And that face! Agony masked his features so much that I feared him as I would a monster. My heart thudded and begged my lungs for oxygen.

  Both hands covered his ears and a low growl erupted from his contorted lips. Frozen, I watched the man drag himself to a small wooden table in the corner. The world around me turned black except for this horrific scene of him crawling across our dining room floor. A discolored patch of skin peeled from behind his ear. Blood matted dark brown hair to light brown neck. His shirt tag, somehow untouched by the carnage, stuck straight up and white as ever.

  The fingers of one hand dug into the bare floor. His nails crunched and snapped off. One arm dragged his entire body as his other hand scraped at the back of his ear. I grabbed the wall beside me to stop the world from spinning and steady my legs.

  He used the table to pull himself upright. Growls turned to pitiful moans. My heart lurched. The man hunched over as if to vomit. Before I could wonder why he crawled all the way over there to puke, he bashed his head on the table.

  If you’ve never heard a human skull smack against a wooden table — the dull thud of a splitting watermelon — I suggest you keep it that way. Every thwump sent shivers up my spine and bile to my throat.

  His legs buckled and threatened to drop him to the floor. Yet he persevered. Charred sizzling chunks of skin slid down his neck onto the crisp white doilies. Pancakes burned their way back up my throat.

  Between thuds his bloodied hands still tore at the flesh behind his ear. His finger disappeared knuckle-deep as he rooted around in the hole he’d made.

  Heavy seconds trudged by as he retrieved his prize. The chip was larger than most at half an inch square. Upon seeing it, relief softened the inhuman mask of his face.

  Congealed blood hung from the corner, ready to drop in the already darkening puddle of him on the table. The chip hung out of his head by a slimy tendon, exposed but still connected to his skull.

  I heard a low moan, then recognized it as my own, as air found its way out of my lungs.

  A hollow sigh escaped the man’s lips as he flopped to the floor and convulsed. The table teetered and dishes rained on top of him.

  Glass shattered in the distance and my mom screamed. The commotion snapped me out of my daze as she rushed to his side. Mom cradled his mutilated head in her arms and kissed him, chanting his name.

  “Kerning... Kern... Kern...” My mom’s tears poured over the carnage on my dad’s face as she synced with him. Her mournful wails harmonized with his last gurgles, creating the most gut-wrenching song. She took the chip from his fingers and tried to shove it back in the open wound behind his ear. Her head flung back. Dark locks of wavy hair dragged the floor and soaked up my dad’s coagulated blood.

  My legs turned to jelly and I leaned hard against the wall. Through my fingers I stared at the chip-to-chip mind meld between my parents. My mom suffered through every excruciating moment of my dad’s death with him. And I was powerless to help. Fear strangled me. Muffled cries stuck in my throat.

  Breathing ragged and shallow as one my mom escorted my dad on his journey out of this world. Only the whites of her eyes were visible as they rolled into her head. Her grief song died as his chest heaved.

  Never did I run to help my dad or cry out for my mom. I just held my breath and the silverware and watched. In my defense, I was a kid. But still, to stand idly by and allow your flesh and blood to be reduced to a pile of, well, flesh and blood. Disgraceful.

  Silence blared as my dad’s body expelled the last of itself onto our dining room floor. The floor that a week ago he’d sworn to finally get around to polishing. The floor where that very morning my mom had yelled at me for leaving my holopad. This was the floor where my dad glitched and died, taking the innocent little girl inside me with him.

  Electric charged air stung my chest as my body forced me to breathe again. My ears and skin buzzed.

  After my dad’s last twitches, my mom’s cheeks returned to near pink. It struck me how that was the first time I’d ever seen them any other color. Her usual light oaken skin always had that mischievous tinge of pink that Dad said meant she was up to something.

  Her eyes, black and barely open, settled back into their normal positions. She straightened herself, smoothing long matted hair down her blood-stained apron. Turning those empty eyes toward me she whispered, “Synta, go find your brother.”

  I got as far as the bottom of the stairs before my feet stopped cold. The screech of my sneakers on hardwood echoed through the quiet house. I crumpled in on myself, shaking.

  My stomach turned, sending hot saliva to my mouth. Every muscle in my body seized. The pancakes fo
und their escape onto a large bamboo plant beside the banister, leaving me no time to hold back my hair. Soon my dark curls dripped vomit, hanging limply down my dress, a perfect mirror of Mom’s.

  She’s gonna be so mad, was the only coherent thought I could manage. I’d witnessed something too big, too heavy to comprehend. Instead my mind latched onto something it could handle. Something immediate.

  I had puked in the last present my dad had gotten my mom.

  Tension released its grip on my head and gut, now purged. As the physical pain subsided it left a void for something worse. My mind picked at the fortress around the memory of my dad’s death, even as it still built it. I saw it again, darkness falling away. The way that blood-soaked chip dangled from his neck. He almost got it out.

  Would that have made a difference? What if I’d helped? Run to him and yanked it out for him? Called for my mom? Would he still be alive? If I had set the table like Mom told me to, the dishes wouldn’t have fallen on him. Did I kill him? I killed him.

  “Synta, I’m hungy,” came a shrill voice bounding down the stairs. My wet face snapped up in what must have been a snarl because Brooks screwed his tiny face up, ready to cry.

  Unsure if my legs would hold, I eased myself up and wiped the vomit from my bottom lip onto the dress. I couldn’t stop the momentary tinge of satisfaction at ruining the stupid thing. Still heaving, I swallowed the last lump of stomach contents that hadn’t made it out and exhaled. “I’ll make you a sandwich. Go back upstairs.”

  Two tan little bare feet dropped one step lower.

  “I mean it, Bit. Mommy told me to feed you upstairs.” I attempted a stern tone.

  “I heard stuff.” A grubby finger tapped at his chip, disappearing behind his curls, lighter and thicker than my own. Giant brown eyes begged me to tell him it was alright.

  My heart jumped, then stopped. “It’s fine, Bit. Daddy just fell and got an owie. Mommy’s fixing it now. But we have to stay upstairs.” I motioned toward the playroom and gave my best imitation of Mom’s ‘now’ face.

  “But —”

  //Now!// I yelled at him through our chips. The simple act of transmitting sent fresh images of my dad’s bloody chip racing through my mind. I struggled to keep them from broadcasting to my little brother along with the command.

  Brooks’s eyes widened.

  Since the removal order many years ago, we weren’t supposed to chip back and forth, not even inside the house. If anyone found out we still had chips, or that our parents had illegally chipped Brooks...

  I smiled and shooed him on. “Everything’s fine, Bit. Please do what I said. And wash your hands for Stone’s sake.”

  Brooks scrunched his nose. “You go wash yours.” He screeched with laughter and ran up the stairs, straight to the playroom. I looked at my hands. Spittle had mixed with days of grime to form a gooey layer of slick mud which I promptly wiped down the dress.

  Chapter Two

  January 20, 5 AG

  Synta allowed herself to be shoved not-so-gently into the dank interrogation room. These clowns better count themselves lucky.

  “As you were saying,” the big one — bigger one — motioned toward a single tattered metal folding chair across from him.

  The slightly less massive guard lumbered to the corner and leaned back, arms folded.

  “I do not recall,” Synta flopped onto the unforgiving chair, noticing in mid-air that it was unpadded. She sent out a silent ‘thank you’ to her mom and DNA for providing plenty of natural cushion.

  “Cut the crap!” Guard One pounded both fists onto the table between them. “I already had to listen to you start all the way back at Genesis with Glitch Day. So how about we move this along a bit.”

  “Genesis?” Synta’s gaunt face feigned blankness. She crossed her arms as the lesser giant had and studied her surroundings. Aside from the usual disrepair of life post-glitch—faded gray paint peeling off moldy walls—this was one of the better rooms she’d been in. It was much nicer, and warmer, than the burned-out gas station she woke up in.

  Overhead, three of the four O-LED lighting panels had long since gone dark. The last flickered its death throes. Faint pulses of light illuminated a Rorschach-shaped birthmark on Guard Two’s bald head. It mesmerized Synta; each strobe of dim yellow transforming the darker brown spot into a splattered butterfly, or a genie, or woman’s dislocated pelvis. Synta knew she was staring but she couldn’t help but wonder what it would become next.

  Synta examined the signal jammers hanging from each corner, sleek black ovals with one green blinking light. Jammers were one of the only manufacturing fields that survived the Glitch, and business was booming. The BDS 5.2 was top of the line. No transmissions getting in or out. Shit, these guys came prepared.

  Through padded walls Synta listened to the ISS Unity’s faint whir. Everything was going as planned. Plan Z, but still a plan. She picked at the mud under her thumb nail and waited.

  Guard One took out his gun and laid it on the table, just out of reach of her shackled hands. “You saw someone glitch and —”

  “Someone?” It was Synta’s turn to pound the table. She lurched forward. Heat crept up her neck and erupted from her pale brown cheeks. The jagged scar on her right cheek flared. The chains on her feet and hands rattled. She pulled the stretched out black sweater sleeve to cover the marks on her wrist. “My father!” Each word spat forth like venom.

  “Yes,” Guard One’s own voice never fluctuated. “And then.” He flicked his left eye up once to start the implanted recording device.

  Synta eased back and scratched her closely shorn head. Her fingers still expected much more to hold onto. Noise-canceling headphones hung limp around her neck as a stark reminder of her failure. She then leveled her fierce brown eyes on the guard and willed her heartbeat to steady itself. “Of course, moving right along.”

  Chapter Three

  May 14, 2241

  The next morning, the world outside my house was way too quiet. Even the birds knew not to breathe. No sound came through the off-white walls. Only a random red or blue light peeked in the windows.

  Mom languished on the couch, one hand over her head like the fainting actresses in those old movies the whole family used to watch together. She still wore the bloody apron with Dad’s life force clinging to it in clumps. She hadn’t moved much at all since dragging herself from the dining room. One foot dangled from underneath Nana’s patchwork quilt.

  Shock still had a firm grip on me as I sat on the floor at the foot of the couch, rocking Brooks in my lap and resting a hand on Mom’s leg. If she moved at all, a sensation I’d been desperately hoping to feel run across my fingers, I’d be the first to know. Three fingers on my other hand, of their own volition, tapped out a simple melody on the floor beneath me. One, two, three, four. Over and over I drummed out the opening chords to “Somewhere Only We Know.” Dad had taught it to me when I was barely Brooks’s age in hopes that I’d love the piano as much as he did. It worked. The rise and fall of repeating chords lulled me into a trance as I sat, ready for the next crazy thing. It was coming. That much I knew.

  Brooks twisted a chubby little hand through a dingy brown ringlet that still hung over my shoulders, unwashed and unbrushed. Normally, I’d never let him touch such disgusting things, but that sort of worry didn’t seem to matter anymore.

  Mom moaned and whimpered above us, still weak from her chip meld with Dad on his death floor in that room. Every thought that flew through my mind always found its way back to that room.

  Their agony held me hostage; the scent of my dad’s charred flesh and that horrible thwump of his skull on the table. I shook my head hard and flipped the switch on my holopad to distract Brooks with some TV time. Unfortunately, for the past three hours President Sturn’s speech played on a constant loop in our heads and on every channel. Even the cartoon ones. It was so much worse than the pop-up ads. There was no escape. So Brooks and I watched the speech, on repeat, until we could recite it ourselve
s.

  “My fellow Continentals.

  “First, I’d like to take this opportunity to express my deepest condolences to all our families who have been affected by this tragic event. Rest assured that my staff and I are investigating this incident with the utmost urgency. At this time, it is unclear how many citizens in how many territories experienced this malfunction. My staff and I are doing, and will continue to do, everything in our power to get to the bottom of this.

  “From what we’ve ascertained so far, there was a hardware malfunction during a routine maintenance patch. If you refer to your patch schedules on the Citizen Server page, you will see that Patch 143 included a scrubber and GPS sync. This is all standard code. Preliminary reports indicate that the EC421, an older and less reliable model chip, was the hardest hit.

  “I urge all of you who are receiving this message to please visit your nearest Emergency Operations Shelter now and have your chips removed. Whether it’s the EC41 we’ve identified, or any other model, please err on the side of caution and remove all remaining microchips. We are in no position at this point to guarantee the safety of any chip. There is no way to know if this issue is contained to the EC421, or if all processor models will be affected. We are also mobilizing Chip Removal units at this time. They will be stationed throughout the country to assist in these mass extraction efforts.

  “Now, to those of you who removed your chips as requested with the passage of Article 27 back in ‘36, I’d like to personally thank you for your prompt dedication to National Safety. I can assure you that, with no chip, you are in no danger from this faulty patch. Your quick adherence to the previous safety measure no doubt saved your life, and the lives of those you love.

  “Again, to all of you who are receiving this message, were dealing with preliminary data here. We will update you on this matter as quickly as we have more information. My staff is reaching out to the Continental Consulates in our Sister Nations to determine the full scope of the situation. Please give us time to investigate this matter.