Cynetic Wolf
SMOKING GUN

I ran toward the noise. It was off the trail a ways. Bushes and thorns tore at me as I panicked. It was too late.

The smell of burnt wood wafted through the air. A blaster? “Raek, is that you? Help!” Fitz called.

Shoot. My mind went into overdrive. The DNS had captured Fitz. How many...

A growing fire flickered, and I smelled, mmm. What was that? My stomach was playing tricks on me. No... Was that roast boar?

What was going on? Bandits?

Fitz sat cross-legged, stoking a fire, smiling as a thick slab of juicy meat cooked on the makeshift spit. It smelled delicious. “Raek, that you? You can come out now. It was a test.”

I crept through the trees and stepped into the otherwise empty clearing. “What’s going on? Where’s the DNS? What happened?”

“Calm down, son.” He smiled. “It was just a test. You passed.”

When I didn’t say anything, he added, “You have to be paranoid to survive now. Everyone’s looking for you. You don’t know who you can trust, not even me. Now come here, help me with this boar.”

“No!” I spat. Prick. “Why’d you do that? I could’ve killed you.”

“But you didn’t.” He gave me a serious look and held my stare. “You stayed level-headed, investigated, and were ready for anything. You even made a good plan.”

But still… “And the person following us?”

“A deer, probably used to humans feeding it and wanted to stay close. I brought the boar from school,” he added.

“You’re sure it is safe?” There could still be something out there.

He nodded. He’d set up perimeter sensors.

Idiot. I should punch him.

He bribed me with the lenses, and, by the time I’d finished with the glasses, the hog was perfect: a blood-red rare. Mom never hit the mark.

“Those lenses,” Fitz said once we’d finished eating, “are just some of what your eyes are capable of once you get your SmartCore running. Known a few cynetics in my day,” he added when he saw my surprise.

I sighed. “It doesn’t always work. If I tap here,” I touched my right temple, “sometimes it activates, and other times, it doesn’t.” I could hear the frustration in my voice. None of it made sense.

“We’ll figure it out.” He patted me on the back. “Hang in there.”

A half-hearted nod. And somehow, I had to replace my family.

We slept most of the day, using the packs to block the sun from our eyes. I slept better on that tiny pad than I’d ever slept on our ratty mattress at home. Vynce rolled a lot and Mom snored. How were they doing? Where were they? Were they okay?

Guilt gripped me. It had been twelve hours since I’d thought about them. My own family, and I was leaving them behind. What son, what brother, what person does that? I had to replace them.

“We made good time last night,” Fitz said, saving me from myself for the time being. “In a day or two, we’ll be outside the danger zone. I doubt they’ll use many drones or VTOLs this far out.”

“You’ve seen a drone? In real life, I mean, not in the holos?”

“I have.” A mischievous look crossed his face, an epic story in the glint of his eyes. “Let’s say drones and I have a difficult relationship. They’ve caused me a few headaches. To be fair, I’ve shot down a couple. Guess we’re even.”

So that’s where he’d gotten his money. “Did you sell them?”

He shook his head. “Too risky. DNS monitor back channels, don’t want anyone having that kind of power…” Which led to a rambling story about AI and some dystopian surveillance sci-fi he’d read once.

Freaky stuff. If it was true, if companies and governments could watch you everywhere… At least we didn’t have that. I shuddered. There’d be no rebels, no freedom, no life. It was hard to wrap my head around.

A bird cawed, pulling me back to thinking about drones and searching the skies. If they had weaponized drones, what chance did we have? I’d seen dark web holos, crowds of animotes gunned down, bombs left and right.

We continued for hours, alone with our thoughts. What was he thinking about? He’d had a life, by all appearances a good one, and he threw it all away... for me. I felt bad.

And Elly... She’d be here if it wasn’t for me. I should have been there, or not let us get separated in the first place. Fitz interrupted my guilt like calling on me in class. “While we’ve got time, how much do you know about the cities, about the different subspecies?”

Enough. “I had a project in Political Theory a ways back, Mr. Cadvin’s class, before he disappeared,” I added. “We studied non-governmental textbooks, banned stuff: the megacities that fell apart during the Bioplague—Singapore, Paris, New York…. They’re dead zones now.” I outlined everything I knew of how animote labor helped them recover.

“And cynetics, I’m not sure what their tech can do. Obviously, built-in blasters.” I lifted my arm for emphasis. “And I’ve heard they, I mean we—” The weirdness of it made me uncomfortable “—We have reinforced skin and bones too. Continuous connectivity, enhanced vision.” I paused, thinking. “That’s it.”

Fitz gave me a studious stare before breezing over enhancers and emulates, which triggered the image of the officer’s gushing blue blood. At least he’d get to reboot in a new surrogate body. Was that still murder?

“Not half bad.” He quizzed me about the GDR and DNS, and the founding of the New America Government as we passed a weird tree formation, its massive trunk split into three vertical limbs like an inverted tripod. He noticed my eyes wandering.

“Raek!” he stepped in front of me and locked eyes. “This isn’t school, I’m not your teacher. There won’t be a test at the end. This is your life we’re talking about. I need you to focus.” He grabbed my shoulders. “Trust me, the small things are the difference between life and death.” His eyes moistened.

“Sorry,” I mumbled.

“Don’t be sorry, be alive. Animotes everywhere need you. There’s never been a mixed-species human. Do you know what that means?” His eyes flashed, but the anger faded from his voice.

My stomach growled. Fitz must have heard it. “We should stop here, replace cover before it gets light. I’ll work on camp.”

“I’ll get firewood.”

Twenty minutes later, I’d loaded as much as I could carry, my third and final load.

Ambling back, a lone wolf appeared, watching me. He—I think it was a he—was huge. Gray matted fur covered him, tints of white and black speckling his snout and backside. The legs were raw power. Combined with razor-sharp teeth and crushing bite strength, he was a killing machine.

“Was it you that howled that day?” His eyes were dark as night. “Were you warning me?” I paused as he sniffed the air, holding my gaze. “If only you could understand me. I don’t want any trouble. I’m like you, an outcast, a hunter. I live for the chase. But now, I’m the one being hunted. Guess you know about that.” I sighed.

Fitz said something in the distance and I turned. When I looked back, the wolf was gone, a ghost disappearing into the night.

Dumping the firewood, I strode up to Fitz. “Where are we headed?”

“Old Canada, used to be called Toronto but these days people call it Lhalas.” He smiled. “Look at a map, anything that’s left has a new name.”

“What’s in Lhalas?” It was one of the few remaining megacities, more than two million people… mind-boggling.

Fitz’s eyes twinkled an annoying glow. “We’re going to see an old friend.”

I’d learned better than to ask. He’d tell me, or he wouldn’t. That’s just how he was.

It was strange to think I was leaving Kiag, the place I’d lived my whole life, all my friends and family, neighbors, memories. Kiag’s too small to replace on most maps, but it was home for me. It was Old America, our history classes covered that much. I wasn’t sure which of the fifty-two little countries in the American empire it was though. It was weird to think about so many governments. Who was in charge? Who told everyone what to do? I had trouble wrapping my head around it, let alone hundreds of other nations around the world.

“Get some sleep, we’ll need it.” Fitz laid down, twisted his shoulder, and closed his eyes, already asleep.

But me, I was wired. I wanted to figure out this darn SmartCore thing. Maybe it was like a computer. Sitting cross-legged by the fire, I tried voice commands. “Activate,” “On,” “Turn On,” “Begin,” “Start,” “Reboot,” “Restart.” Ten whole minutes of nothing. “Damnit!” I jumped up, kicked a nearby tree, and stomped my throbbing foot. How do I do this?

The foghorn snores ended as Fitz sprang out of bed, eyes wide. “What’s happening?” he snapped, more alert than I’d expect.

“Nothing.” I looked away, ashamed I’d let it get to me. “It’s my freaking SmartCore. I can’t make it work.”

“Go to sleep, son. We have a long day tomorrow.” With that, he rolled over and was asleep again in seconds. Cue the bagpipes.

Taking a deep breath, I sat shaking. I could almost hear Grandma’s knuckled voice telling me to meditate. It couldn’t hurt. Sitting by the dwindling fire, I closed my eyes and focused on my breathing. Thoughts bounced, but I let them drift away into the abyss.

Who knows how much time passed. After an eternity, something happened, like resetting a computer or a secondary operating system. I felt… different, like my brain could move in a new dimension. I had access to something that wasn’t there before, and stepped in.

A command center filled of knobs and gauges and screens appeared. A glowing interface to my right caught my eye. I touched it and felt my arms again. It was strange. I didn’t ‘feel’ them per se, I felt them, knew them—their activity level, output, maximum capacity. Flexing my fingers, similar insights popped into my subconscious. The power in my hands, the sharpness of my claws, even the growth of my fur.

I was scared, but even more intrigued. Pulling back, I was in the command center again. The new sensations remained in my arms and hands, on the edge of my awareness.

A helmet looking thing sat in the center of the room, like the old astronaut ones from the space race. One small step for communism, one giant leap for mankind. This felt like that.

I slid it over my head, and when it touched, another shift. My body disappeared. Everything was gone, even my arms. I was consciousness, nothing more. No interfaces or joysticks, monitors or gauges; just black empty abyss.

Something like feelings emerged. The light, the feeling—whatever it was—grew larger, brighter. The empty landscape expanded.

One glowing field was interesting, different and yet familiar. It felt foreign.

As it grew, my understanding grew with it. For the heck of it, I touched the brightness.

My body was ripped through a vortex.