The Reality Trust

By Lydia Marcell

Toria Gensai, a terminally-ill assassin, is determined to use her blade to cut the world free in the time she has left, but can she start a revolution before her disease claims her?

In summer of 2086, dissent brews in Vancouver, home to both the Helios megacorporation headquarters and the Pity Market, a tented slum for economic refugees. Helios’ de-facto world government has created a vast divide between their own wealthy employees and the rest of society. The Vanguard, a special corporate police force, tirelessly pursues Toria and her employers, the Reality Trust. Toria’s team, Eclipse, has been tasked with the critical job of eliminating the opposition. Only a few executives stand between the Trust and their goal: the subversion of Helios from within and the release of the corporation’s secret research project to the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jun 24, 2019
• ISBN: 9780359750559

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The Reality Trust

The Reality Trust

A Stuntwoman’s Last Will

& Testament

Lydia E. Marcell

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2019 by Lydia E. Marcell

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without written permission of the copyright owner except for the use of quotations in a book review.

For more information, address: [e-mail].

Cover design by Adam Schmidt

ISBN 978-0-359-75055-9

"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it,

doesn't go away."

― Philip K. Dick

Daybreak

I feel like I’m forgetting something.

Vancouver’s financial district stretches out beneath me: a nighttime forest of steel and carbon fiber skyscrapers lit by blue-white LED lights, dotted with red aircraft warning beacons, and home to the man I’m going to kill tonight.

The metamaterial of my suit contracts as I tap a few buttons on the back of my hand, lighting up my entire body with goosebumps. Its armor plates mold tightly to my limbs and torso in a protective hug. The heads-up display lights up as I settle my goggles over my eyes, and I take my position at the VTOL jet’s wide- open door. Soft, flexible, polymer membranes stretch beneath my arms and between my legs, not unlike a flying squirrel’s patagium. Gusts of air rush into the passenger cabin, where they’re caught by the metamaterial wings, tugging at the membranes like an impatient child.

The white-letters of the display on the back of my hand shine embedded in bright blue screen: Flight Ready.

2,000 meters beneath me, the concrete sidewalks of the city lay crisscrossed like paths of a nanotube network. The tread of my boots squeaks against the edge of the door as I let myself fall into empty sky, my arms pinned against my body.

I don’t dare deploy the wings now: the downdraft from the VTOL’s rotors would throw off the angle of my dive at best and send me into a death-spin at worst.

A deep, exhilarating breath courses through my lungs. The freedom of the drop is like nothing else: it’s not about the jolt of adrenaline, and what I feel in free fall is nothing like fear. Falling is a joy, so long as hitting the ground isn’t a concern.

The wind roars in my ears as I rip through the sky. No matter what follows, I’m alive in this moment.

Five seconds into the drop I stretch out my arms against the wind, extending the membranes of the wingsuit. With these I have control of my descent.

According to the readout in my goggles, I’ve got a perfect 3:1 glide ratio. The city rises up toward me and I twist my body to adjust the descent vector.

Fifteen seconds into the drop: trouble.

There’s a jetliner about a kilometer ahead coming in for a landing at Vancouver Airport, some kilometers to the south. Its vector crosses my flight path—but with this much time, a minor correction is all...

I need to... avoid….

In the blink of an eye, I’m surrounded by birdsong and daylight.

A melody of summertime breezes plays with my hair; I smile at the warmth of the sun as I look up at picturesque clouds and then glance down to realize, muzzily, that I’m free falling toward a turquoise sea in the assured safety of a dream.

A turbulent patch of air sends me gasping back into reality.

The birdsong shifts, transforming into the suit’s alarm chiming in my ear, its sound borne by a cochlear implant that ensures that I will always, always be able to hear its chiming. The UI flashes red; a desperate overlay on the alternating darkness of night sky and sparkling lights from the city below. My limbs are flailing back and forth uselessly, tossed around like a forgotten flag in a typhoon. I’m in a spin out.

The readout tells me I’m 30 seconds into the drop—15 crucial seconds evaporated in that dream.

My emergency training kicks in, taking control of my every movement. As soon as I stabilize, the jetliner’s tail swallows my view of the city. I absently note that the bright purple tail reads Air Hawaii, as if the airline made any difference in how dead I’m about to be.

My kilometer of maneuvering room has become no more than fifty meters of hot jet wash.

There’s no time to curse. The wingsuit’s membranes pull taut with the force of my every muscle trying to rend control back from the chaotic air currents in the jet’s wake. Time itself stretches out. My concentration narrows to a knife point. I could count the rivets in the jetliner’s white underside as I race beneath the fuselage, just a meter and a half from disaster.

Once clear of the jetliner, I bank hard to get back on course for the Morgan Building. It’s not the tallest skyscraper in the financial district—a fact I’m grateful for, given that I’ve lost too much altitude to land anywhere higher.

It’s tight. I have to pull up my knees to clear the concrete parapet as my parachute grabs the air a little too late. I jog to a stop just in front of the rooftop helipad’s door.

With both my feet on the ground, the parachute collapses behind me, exhausted, and automatically reels itself into my backpack. The wingsuit membranes go brittle at my command, crumbling away like desiccated butterfly wings, returning full range of motion to my now-free limbs.

Five breaths.

That’s all the time I allow myself to process everything that didn’t happen during the flight, then I move on. It’s all I need. It has to be.

I’ve got half an hour until dawn.

The adrenaline from my near-miss feels good, it lets me feel normal, a rare gift these days. But the edge that it gave me is already dulling. I remove a glove and push a hypospray, preloaded with my preferred stimulant, against the bare skin of my wrist.

I shouldn’t be thinking about what it will mean when I become resistant to this drug, too.

The familiar jolt of electrified pharmaceuticals cuts through my veins as I work my fingers back into my glove. The self-sealing seam between the sleeve and glove weaves itself shut once more. That injection just bought me an hour of guaranteed, medicated alertness. There will be no more microsleeps on this job.

I tear off my goggles with one hand and pull open the heavy rooftop door with the other, trusting the digital camo makeup around my eyes to disguise the only patch of skin visible to the security cameras.

Most of these cameras are already paused on a convenient freeze frame by our remote specialist. If a camera did escape his attention, the black and white dazzle designs on my face will prevent Helios Corporation’s facial recognition software from doing its job.

The bizarre geometric patterns are an idea lifted from a century-old navy technique for disguising ships at sea. Today, the fashion-forward look is the hallmark of the privacy enthusiast in the better districts. Unlike them, I wouldn’t bother with the facepaint for the sake of antiquated values or, worse, vanity. My own preferences aside, I can’t afford to be anything but a privacy enthusiast in this line of work.

I make my way through the unlit hall which remains asleep in eco mode: low lights, no digital concierge waiting for my requests with bated processes.

My suit camouflages me from the passive infrared motion sensors in the walls which were designed, not for security, but for convenience. The Vantablack v7 finish on my armor doesn’t reflect any light whatsoever, and the nanometers-thick underlayers against my skin are covered in chilled insulation to keep me from melting inside the thermally-locked metamaterial.

I am a blind spot.

During a job like this, I keep the suit’s cooling set to maximum. The coolant is working at full bore even before exertion. Most people would be shivering in such cold, but not me; I’m still sweating. It’s an immutable fact that I’m always sweating, so it doesn’t matter that the moisture gets wicked away before I can even feel damp. I still know I’m sweating, just as my suit’s sensors know my core temperature is a few degrees too high and are trying, in vain, to correct it.

Tonight, the fever isn’t my problem; it’s the fuel behind my purpose.

The target’s private entrance to the helipad features a short hallway that will lead directly into his office. It’s also where the bodyguard is waiting.

The woman in the conspicuously inconspicuous suit stands at attention. She holds up a hand, indicating that I should stop where I am. I don’t.

You’re not authorized to— she starts. I select a small knife from the sleeve on my forearm and quickly jab it into her throat. Shock, and a severed set of vocal chords, keeps her from making any more fuss about my lack of credentials.

Without regard for stealth, I throw the final door open.

Startled in his seat, the target spills his coffee, staining the blue light from his desk projector a rusty brown. "What the hell—" When he realizes that my shape doesn’t match any of his assistants, Mithras Investments’ CEO Blaine Warren blanches. His skin nearly matches his white hair. Then, he begs. Wait! No! No, no, no, wait… you can have everything in my executive account! The vacation home in New Alaska Bay is yours now! I’m sure we can work something out! He stutters a nervous laugh.

They always beg. They never seem to understand: there’s nothing to negotiate. I rest my hand on the hilt of my sword. After a dozen of these assignments, the telescoping blade has become an extension of my arm. The unique stance required to free the weapon smoothly from the sheath strapped to my thigh is

second nature to me now. A mote of orange light traces over the self-assembling edge of the sword, rendering it as sharp as volcanic glass.

Warren’s high-backed chair hits the floor, upset as he desperately stumbles to his feet. Blind panic nearly sends him tumbling backward over it, but he recovers and he tries to run.

I wait.

I allow him to take two final steps on his fine imported rug. Those two steps only serve to close the gap between the man and my sword.

Two cuts.

The first, upward through his torso; the twisting blade flashes with ruddy light reflected from his desktop. The second, downward through his neck and shoulder. Soft flesh gives so easily compared to the crunch of splitting vertebrae and cartilage.

Ugly noises rise from the collapsed flesh. The visceral scents of blood and death fill the executive office, replacing coffee and cigar smoke.

I tease a sheet of paper—an expensive commodity—from my sleeve pocket and kneel down to place it on Warren’s chest as he concludes the business of dying. The death receipt, emblazoned with the Reality Trust’s elegant logo and creed, balances atop a bloodless patch of Warren’s silk jacket.

Looking over the body, I must remind myself that this is good work. No, important work. There is no good in it today. The good will follow later. It has to. Though I don’t expect to see it in my lifetime.

The Trust only leaves messages, not evidence. Untraceable papers, unremarkable inks, and unidentifiable assassins are our only trademarks. Every assassination conveys its sanguine message precisely as designed, and nothing more.

I am not the author, only the scribe.

Toria. You’ve got incoming. It’s Nathan, the remote team lead. He’s the one who tamed the cameras and turned them against Mithras Investments. Heliosec? I ask, awakening the small, black microphone taped to my throat. Curiosity has me crouching low to look for a silent alarm switch under Warren’s desk. Nothing. I consider checking his body, but why bother? Keying a personal security system to vital signs would be criminally stupid. Help could only come once it’s too late, and the alarm’s gone off already. Heliosec’s standard operating procedures are about as useless, though. I’ve easily got ten minutes before they make it to the top floor.

No. Uniform’s Vanguard. Nathan’s terse answer comes over the static rush of his fingers furiously working his keyboards. They’re the real deal. Their overrides breeze through anything I do to lock down the elevators.

My heart leaps into my throat.

Heliosec would amble to the top floor, tripping over their protocols the entire way. But the Vanguard doesn’t trip on anything, doesn’t operate on protocol, and certainly doesn’t worry about imitating due process. The Vanguard is everything that Helios’ public relations department won’t let their standard private military, Helios Security, become.

Footsteps hammer through the hall, lights coming on as they wake from power- saving slumber. Time’s up.

The windowpane vibrates as I slap a shatterspider onto the transparent carbon. Behind me, the first officers are already through the doorway by the time I’ve finished typing commands into the interface on the back of my hand.

Sky blue and white uniforms—Nathan was right, they’re Helios’ New Vancouver Guard. The first amber rays of the sun glint on a perfect row of swords, each pointing directly at me. Five officers in all; an entire squad. They’ve increased their numbers recently, so it’s no wonder even the routine patrols are well- staffed.

The gaunt, grim-faced man in the center is Paul Kanin, 3rd Division Captain. I recognize him from the press conference held to announce the formation of the Vanguard.

He addresses me across the edge of his upturned blade. Drop your weapons and present your identification chip for scanning. Judging by his tone, he doesn’t expect me to comply. He doesn’t even want me to comply. His predacious eyes study me, taking my measure. I wonder, does he see prey or competition?

Nathan might have the building’s surveillance on lockdown, but there’s no doubt that the Vanguard officers are wired. Not to protect their suspects, but to enable their hunt for the Trust. I keep silent. I refuse to give them a voiceprint.

Well? Kanin insists. He pushes through the line of Vanguards, closing the distance between us to only two meters. I hold my ground.

You’ve got nothing on us.

The spider responds to Kanin’s question for me: a quick, clear chime from the window behind me. Its analysis is complete, and the shatterspider is now a moment away from triggering resonance. I offer Kanin the slightest nod before I turn to launch myself at the window. Crystalline shards rain down over my shoulders as I throw myself through the late Blaine Warren’s hard-won executive view.

Landscape

For the third time today, I’m in freefall. My goggles settle over my eyes, just in time for the User Interface to flash blue, confirming that the wingsuit is ready. No sooner than that, the UI turns red, warning me that I’m about to become a crater in the pavement if I don’t act.

With a few precise movements, I reorient my body and deploy the wings. Fresh dawn air fills my lungs, purging the rank odor of violence that soaked the penthouse.

A patch of morning fog covers my escape, breaking line of sight with the Vanguard, who I imagine are cursing my escape. Kanin, however, I don’t take for the angry type. No, Kanin’s intelligent; he’s probably poring over the Trust’s note, studying the scene, and guessing at our next move like a modern reimagining of an old-timey detective.

Gliding between skyscrapers, I make my way to the rendezvous point via the longest, most circuitous route my altitude will allow. My reflection slides across the silvered windows of the financial district and I catch glimpses of myself through the fog: an oversized falcon, wings pinned in a never-ending dive. The sun is higher now, and long, yellow spears of daylight pierce the space between the buildings. Their golden glow turns the shadows blue.

The streets beneath me pulse with the aerodynamic forms of cars carrying workers. The commuters are enjoying their morning meals, reading the news, or finishing their grooming. All of them are dutifully ready to warm the seats of thousands of mesh-backed chairs. Each one is a single corporate whim away from the Pity Markets. How many of these people recognize their privilege? I know most of them understand the economic precarity of their lives, even if they won’t admit it to the pollsters.

No, in the polls, they describe themselves as comfortable and confident. And I believe them when they say they consider Helios a benevolent force; humanity’s savior from the dark days after peak oil. That might have been true, once. Now, they couldn’t be more wrong.

The financial district high-rises give way to a residential area made up of towering apartments and retail shops where the corporate middle-class are kept. They exist only to give corporate press secretaries a middle-class to champion in front of the public. This gilded cage is attainable luxury, the dream of every student in the Pity Markets—once they pay off their loans. The previous generations might have called it the American Dream. At least, they would have said as much in the dried-out nation to the south. We Canadians know the phrase well. We heard it often enough.

Today, Helios owns everything important in every country. They manage the roads, the airports, the water systems, most of the manufacturing outside pharmaceuticals. Their rise to power began with the announcement of their plans to rebuild the entire global energy infrastructure in a single decade. An offer that no nation could afford to refuse. After that watershed decision, anything Helios and their affiliates don’t run, a handful of competing corporations do.

Communications, cryptocurrency servers, and healthcare all remain independent and just strong enough to avoid hostile takeover from the reigning Megacorp.

Governments are just for show these days, without any real power to assert their authority. But they make the people feel as though they have a say, letting them believe they have some recourse to suggest that citizens are more than corporate assets with a pulse. Helios can’t take all the credit for the decline of government, though. It was the switch to cryptocurrencies that put an end to them. Suddenly, the dollar, the yen, the euro were all sub-par currencies compared to the untraceable and therefore untaxable Bitcoins. Everyone could trust in the independent, virtual dollars and not even Helios has been able to mint a cryptocurrency that could compete. Today, nationalities have about as much meaning as Viking clan surnames: a mark of heritage and little else. Economic standing is where we claim our identities.

My handler waves from the roof of one of the towers: a silvered cylinder, the runt of the Stanley Hills integrated property development standing at a mere twenty stories tall. The landing’s easier this time, although now there are air handling units to trip over and flagpoles reaching out to tangle my parachute.

As soon as my feet touch the roof, George tosses me a soft duffel bag full of civilian clothes. He collects my backpack while I peel the balaclava-style mask off my face and dismiss the wings. Nice work! Nathan tells me the Vanguard showed up. Not sure how I feel about them catching up to us before the job’s done. If we’re not careful, they’ll be there waiting when we arrive.

My new outfit is inconspicuous, not particularly flattering, and just baggy enough to conceal the state-of-the-art suit underneath. There’s a protein bar in my pocket, a thoughtful gift from my past self when I packed these clothes. It’s unnecessary, now that the stimulant’s eradicated my appetite for the next hour. It’ll keep.

I wait for George to open the door for me. In the off-chance that I get traced, his innocent fingerprints shouldn’t be found with mine. He’s staring at me and I recognize that I haven’t actually spoken to him yet. We shouldn’t be seen on the roof, I say, only to satisfy his social demands. Small talk is always meaningless, and especially worthless during a revolution.

George scoffs. He brushes his dark brown fringe from his eyes and gives me a sour look. My handler is a talkative, curious man; traits that don’t mesh well with my preference for quiet reflection after a job. George is the type of person who needs to be reminded to keep his voice down in a cemetery. But he’s reliable and knows more ways to navigate Vancouver than I could imagine. If I need to disappear, George Penwarden can make it happen at a moment’s notice. I respect him, but I don’t think I like him.

After you, m’lady, he intones cynically, while pulling the door open for me. I cut a quick glance at him; his false chivalry is as welcome as a screw in my sock.

We make our way through the building in silence, using stairs for a few floors and then taking the elevator down to street level where George’s modest one-hour rental Citycar has queued itself up for us. He swipes his subdermal RFID over the door with a wave of his hand, and the door obediently opens for its registered guest. We load ourselves inside the modest living room on wheels. The car courteously scans my RFID, happily saving my false credentials to the city’s safety and traffic records.

"We’re lucky to have you, Toria. Only you could do this work so well. I mean, I have trouble staying awake during the longer stakeout jobs, yet you aren’t bothered by staying up for 72 hours to finish a job. I went through seven pots of coffee keeping an eye on you, and I got to trade off watch with Nathan."

I watch the windows darken as they adapt to our preferred tint settings. His attempt to pry conversation from me by offering accolades holds no interest for me. He can’t bait me into a conversation with flattery. There’s nothing to say.

Once he’s gotten comfortable on the couch, George decides to plough ahead with his half of the conversation. An aggressive tinge in his tone as he asks, So, how long before you drop?

What? I ask, my own tone sharper than I’d intended. George destroyed a nascent silence, and I grieve for it. I feel the vehicle lurch underneath us, signalling that our trip is underway.

You’re amped, I can tell from the way you’re clenching your jaw. There’s also the stunt with that jet that I’m guessing wasn’t just for fun. And, after you get amped, you drop. How long ago did you dose?

I resist the urge to grab an ePage and pull up the news to look for Warren’s obituary; I don’t want to get out a glove and I definitely don’t want my fingerprints inside the Citycar. Instead, I fold my hands in my lap and narrow my eyes at George. My work is finished for today and I have a week before my next assignment. The window of effectiveness for this drug isn’t relevant.

It’s relevant if something comes up. If you’re going to hibernate as soon as we get back, it’s my job to know. George’s expression softens as he leans forward to continue, Listen, Toria, if it’s not working anymore, the case study says you can switch to—

Two other stimulants before I go to sedatives and narcoleptics. Thank you. I cut him off as politely and quickly as I can. I’ve read that case study myself a dozen times and heard the litany of pharmaceutical progressions from George a half-dozen more. If I were fresher, I could probably recite it from memory. But I haven’t slept in three days.

Good to hear you’re being responsible about the whole thing, he mutters. Precious few quiet moments pass before he starts up again, this time speaking as a professional rather than a busybody. We’ve only got a few jobs left. You’re almost done.

I nod, glad that the killing will be over soon. No doubt they’ll task me with bodyguard duty, to make sure their people don’t meet the same end as Helios’. With that last exchange, I’ve earned myself a restorative peace for the rest of the trip. Ten minutes bleed away in the morning traffic before we’re deposited on the northern edge of Chinatown. As soon as the door’s shut behind us, the Citycar whirrs off to serve some other patron. We’ll walk from here, to reduce the chance of traces. According to the case study, I could use the light exercise anyway.

Chinatown is hardly like the chaotic, steam-filled streets they put in the movies. The few similarities are threefold: there are some signs in Chinese and many of them are red; there are more Asian people here than elsewhere in the city; and even the newer buildings still feature exaggerated, anachronistic Chinese architecture. There aren’t any glistening ducks hanging in windows anymore, no Triad gangs running around demanding protection money, and there isn’t any laundry draped across the alleyways. Remarkably,