Extreme Makeover
by Henry Melton
Wire Rim Books
Hutto, Texas
This is a work of fiction. Names, events, locations, if they
exist elsewhere, are used here fictitiously and any resemblence to
real persons, places, or events is entirely coincidental.
Extreme Makeover 2008 by Henry Melton
Printing History
First Edition July 2008
ISBN: 978-0-9802253-2-7
Website of Henry Melton:
http://HenryMelton.com/
Cover art by Autumn~Angel
Maps derived from public domain sources
Wire Rim Books
http://WireRimBooks.com/
Contents
Chapter 1: Absorption................................................................................................... 1
Chapter 2: Integration ................................................................................................... 9
Chapter 3: Tropism......................................................................................................17
Chapter 4: Evasion.......................................................................................................25
Chapter 5: Connection ................................................................................................32
Chapter 6: Estrangement ............................................................................................41
Chapter 7: Communication ........................................................................................49
Chapter 8: Searching....................................................................................................57
Chapter 9: Collapse......................................................................................................65
Chapter 10: Isolation ...................................................................................................73
Chapter 11: Misdirection.............................................................................................82
Chapter 12: Façade.......................................................................................................91
Chapter 13: Symptoms ................................................................................................98
Chapter 14: Exercise..................................................................................................106
Chapter 15: Performance ..........................................................................................114
Chapter 16: Walking ..................................................................................................123
Chapter 17: Compliments.........................................................................................130
Chapter 18: Burning...................................................................................................138
Chapter 19: Help ........................................................................................................146
Chapter 20: Questions...............................................................................................152
Chapter 21: Gathering ...............................................................................................159
Chapter 22: Meeting...................................................................................................165
Chapter 23: Chase ......................................................................................................173
Chapter 24: Calls ........................................................................................................182
Chapter 25: Hair.........................................................................................................190
Chapter 26: Blood ......................................................................................................199
Chapter 27: Shopping................................................................................................206
Chapter 28: Drive.......................................................................................................213
Chapter 29: Arrival.....................................................................................................221
Chapter 30: Capture...................................................................................................228
Chapter 31: Beat.........................................................................................................235
Chapter 32: Bodywork...............................................................................................242
Chapter 33: Tracking .................................................................................................251
Chapter 34: Watchdog...............................................................................................258
Chapter 35: Collapse..................................................................................................265
Chapter 36: Escape ....................................................................................................271
Chapter 37: Hiding.....................................................................................................280
Chapter 38: Failsafe ...................................................................................................289
Chapter 39: Closeness................................................................................................295
Chapter 40: Transmission .........................................................................................299
Chapter 41: Countdown............................................................................................310
Chapter 42: Impact ....................................................................................................318
Special thanks to the review crew; Lacy Autumn Andrews,
Jim Dunn, Linda Elliott, Alan McConnell, Mary Ann Melton and
Mary Solomon.
For one inspiring couple,
Jonathan and Debra Andrews
Crescent City Area, California
California: One Long State
Chapter 1: Absorption
G iant Coastal Redwood trees shook with thunder, echoing it
a thousand times, softening the edges and dragging out the
rumble until Deena Brooke couldn’t tell when one strike ended
and the next one began. She blinked at the sweat trickling down
her face stinging her eye. The trail had gotten slippery, slowing
her down even more. Her group was well out of sight. She’d been
alone for ten minutes or more. The hiking trail was like a
rollercoaster, up and down through the ridges, and she just wasn’t
up to it. Her heart hammered. She had to stop. The water bottle
was still empty. She’d drained it thirty minutes ago.
It’s not fair, being fat. She’d done okay, keeping up with the
slow moving group, right until the lightning had started. Then
Mr. Fenner, the science teacher, called Coach Rathborne on the
radio and told her to bring the school bus to a closer trailhead.
Everyone began hurrying along. Rain was expected—everyone
but Bryony Sawyer wore raingear—but not lightning.
Bryony had volunteered to be her ‘trail buddy’ on this senior
science excursion, but Deena had a hard time staying angry over
being abandoned. Bryony was just as thoughtlessly careless as she
was thoughtlessly kind. Everyone else showed up at the bus
wearing ponchos or raincoats. Bryony raced up at the last minute
with a Disney-printed plastic tablecloth she’d grabbed off a picnic
table.
Deena struggled up the next rise, hoping to catch a glimpse
of her friend’s blonde head, surrounded by Mickey Mouse,
Donald Duck and of course several boys.
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Extreme Makeover
Thunder rattled her teeth. Too close. She had to move on.
Don’t stop at the top.
Crack! The flash turned the forest scene bright and washed
out for an instant. She blinked and tried to make sense of the
crackling noise over head. She pushed her cowl back and looked
up.
Massive and black against the clouds, a giant redwood tree
was falling, straight towards her!
Exhaustion forgotten, she ran. The snapping of huge limbs
sounded everywhere. It lasted forever—until she was slapped
hard on the back, down into the mud.
A ll communication was wiped out in an instant, as the
electrical surge swept through the host. Organizers cut off
from others of their caste terminated all processes and dropped
back to their default orders. Most other castes began their
countdown to self-destruction.
Follow orders or die was the core programming of the
nanobots.
The tiny machines, much smaller than the plant cells of the
host organism in which they worked, could not, would not keep
running without a steady stream of communication from the
organizers.
There was a procedure for a catastrophic electrical
discharge. The instant communications became possible, orders
were sent to the monitors: Check on the health of the host.
Reports were not good. Seconds before, the entire three
hundred feet height of the host plant was teaming with activity.
Now, monitors report that the upper third of the tree was no
longer attached, explosively severed from the main trunk.
Organizers in the upper reaches conferred with each other and
agreed to abandon the host. It was no longer viable.
2
Absorption
B ryony Sawyer shrieked, jumping with fright when the
lightning struck so close behind them.
Terrian Trent, built wide and muscular, grinned at her. “Did
it get you?”
“No,” she wrapped her cartoons closer around her shoulders
and looked back along the trail. “I was just... Has anyone seen
Deena?”
The group, three guys and Bryony, looked at each other for
clues. Terrian said, “She probably fell behind.” It wasn’t his job
to watch out for her.
Bill Jeager pointed, “Whoa!”
“What?”
“I thought I saw one of those trees fall.” They listened.
There was a whump that shook the ground.
“We need to keep moving.” Terrian took a couple of steps.
Luther Jennings frowned. He usually kept quiet. He was
smaller than the guys he usually hung out with, and easily
overlooked. He planned it that way. Let the others lead—but no
one seemed to be taking action.
“Bill,” he pointed, “you’re the fastest. Run up ahead and tell
Mr. Fenner that we’ve turned back to look for Deena.” To the
others he waved, “Come on.” Bryony gave him a grateful look,
but he hadn’t done it for her. Something big had fallen back
there, and he needed to see what had happened.
D eena hurt all over. A redwood branch as big as her arm was
pressing hard against her back. Rocks and roots poked at
her uncomfortably. The feathery leaves, ‘good for collecting
water from the coastal fog’ as Mr. Fenner had lectured, were now
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Extreme Makeover
in her face. She pushed with her arms, trying to get up on her
knees, but the limb wouldn’t budge.
She was trapped.
Rain was dribbling down the back of her neck. She winced
as a blob of thick grayish liquid went splat on her cheek.
Tree sap now! The universe was definitely out to get her. Big
fat drops of it were falling all over the place, getting on her skin
and plopping on her poncho.
She tried to push up again, but with no luck.
“Help?” she said, timidly. That wouldn’t do. No matter if
they did make fun of her for getting herself trapped. She needed
real help.
“Help! Can someone help me!” Some real panic crept into
her shout.
“Deena? Is that you?”
It was Mr. Schiller, the math teacher. She’d forgotten that
he’d volunteered to follow the students on the field trip, watching
for stragglers.
“Help, I’m trapped.”
“Stay right where you are, but keep talking. I can’t see you.”
T errian, once he reconciled to the idea of going back, was
quickly in the lead. He reached the huge fallen trunk first,
and climbed on top of it to see on the other side.
“Hey, this thing must be a hundred feet long. I can see the
tree it came from.”
Across the log, Mr. Schiller called, “Terrian, Deena and I are
trapped on this side of the log. Deena is a little shaken up, she got
caught in the branches when it fell.”
Bryony called, “Deena! Are you okay?”
“I’m okay. Don’t worry about me.”
4
Absorption
Luther let the others hunt for the easiest way around the log.
He worked his way through the branches, getting close enough to
put his hand on the fallen trunk. He’d seen other giant fallen logs
on the hike, covered with moss. But with the redwood’s
resistance to decay, there’d been no way to know how old they
had been.
This one was different. He heard its crash. The air was still
filled with the scent of the freshly crushed vegetation. A tree this
tall must have been at least a thousand years old. There was a
sense of a passing era, a sense of history, to be here at this
moment, and to touch a dying giant.
“P lease, go on without me. I’m fine.”
She was very grateful to be walking. Until Mr.
Schiller pulled a little folding saw out of his backpack and freed
her, she’d been on the edge of panic.
Bryony wasn’t convinced by her words. “I’ve got some skin
cream that should help with those scratches.”
Deena honestly didn’t mind her friend’s concern, but with
Mr. Schiller wanting to assist her over every root and pebble on
the trail, and with Bryony’s collection of guys looking positively
bored with their rate of progress, Deena knew she was the center
of attention. Not the kind of attention she enjoyed.
The teachers overreacted too. Mr. Schiller called in on his
radio, telling the others that she was unhurt. But there’d been
some other things said as well. “Yes, we’d better call her.”
Deena knew exactly what they were worried about—her
mother.
Mara Brooke, she had no doubt, would wade into battle to
slay dragons if any were so foolish as to attack her only child.
Momma had crossed swords with the teachers more than once.
When she was younger, it had been a comfort to have someone
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Extreme Makeover
take her side over a bad grade or an impossible assignment. But
times had changed. She was a senior now. Okay, things hadn’t
worked out like she’d planned. She’d dropped band. SAT scores
were good, but her grades weren’t quite good enough to inspire
anyone with her college chances.
Every year, it seemed she was just a little slower and a little
fatter.
Bryony’s embroidered white top with ribbon laces and the
matching hip-hugger slacks were adorable. But not only would
Deena look obscene in something like that, nothing even
remotely nice in her size could be had at the Crescent City stores.
Nearly all her tops were simple unflattering pullovers, and the
ones that buttoned had to be safety-pinned to prevent gaps.
She hated the way she looked. She hated the reflection she
could see in other people’s eyes, even when they never said
anything.
Any attention was painful. Anything that reminded others
how slow and useless she’d become was unbearable.
The pain in her back just had to be ignored. Bryony saw her
wince.
“It’s nothing,” Deena whispered, glancing at the boys.
“Chafing.” Bryony nodded wisely.
The school bus was waiting. Deena put on a cheerful face.
The rest of them would all want to know the details of her
accident. She would just have to bear through it.
About the only good thing to happen was that the tree sap
must have been rinsed off by the rain. There was no trace of it on
her face, or on her legs. It was even gone from the rain poncho.
O rganizers collected the reports from the remaining
members of the monitor caste. This new host body was
much smaller than the previous one, and the population of
6
Absorption
nanobots was hardly tailored to the job. When the evacuation of
the downed tree occurred, the protective fluid was randomly
populated, with no plan other than to reach the soil and migrate
to the nearest root system. The penetration of the new host’s
skin was an accident, the emergency orders hadn’t been
detailed enough to deal with the differences between plant and
animal tissue.
Pulsers, the long-range communicator caste, were very
under-represented in the population, as were datastores.
Organizers conferred among themselves. Was this deficiency
serious enough to warrant wholesale self-destruction?
With the pulsers so limited, it hadn’t been surprising that
communication with other hosts had dropped away almost as
soon as the new host had started moving. With no contact with
the upper hierarchies, new orders would not be arriving. No new
orders meant self-destruction anyway.
But could the assemblers build new pulsers to put them
back in contact? Organizers gave the orders. Analyze the new
host. Look for raw materials for the assemblers to do their job.
D eena saw her mother, waiting by their ancient white Chevy
in the school parking lot. Mara Brooke looked worried, as
if her daughter were to be carried off on a stretcher. Deena
steeled herself to ignore the sharp pain in her back and let no one
see it. It had gotten worse on the ride back to Crescent City. She
hoped a good night’s sleep would take care of it.
Mara elbowed aside Coach Rathborne who’d been helping
her off the bus.
“Deena, baby! Let me help you.” She put her arm under
Deena’s like she were made of ultra-thin glass, and stepped her
carefully toward their car.
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Extreme Makeover
“I’m fine, Mom!” Deena insisted, but it made no impression
on her mother.
Luther watched the scene play out like a poorly scripted
reality show. He knew Mrs. Brooke’s reputation and she was not
one to disappoint. Once Deena was safely in the car, Mara had to
get in her verbal jabs at the school system, the teachers, the
school bus, the California Park System, and the other students.
She knew nothing about what happened, but waiting after the
phone call must have let her imagination run wild.
“Mom! I just want to go home now.”
Luther watched from his car, a blue and white ‘57 Bel Air
Chevy. It was older than the Brooke’s vehicle, but his was a
classic. Their ride was merely preserved. If they didn’t take care
of that rusting fender, he didn’t think it would last much longer.
In spite of the girl’s discomfort, he thought it was cute the
way her mother fought for her.
He sighed and drove away before they noticed him spying. It
was about time for a car wash anyway.
Anything to keep his mind off his empty house.
8
Chapter 2: Integration
D eena woke up at three in the morning with a thirst that she
couldn’t ignore. She reached for the bed frame.
“Ahh!” Back pain took her breath away. She tried again, and
managed to get to her feet, but walking was nearly impossible.
Hobbling, one little step at a time, she made it to the bathroom,
and by the light of the little fluorescent ring on the ceiling, she
checked her back in the mirror.
A swath of blue-black as wide as her hand marked where she
had been struck by the tree limb. Her knees were bruised as well.
When Mom sees this, she’ll really hit the roof.
But if I can’t move in the morning, there’ll be no help for it.
And it hurt. Deena really wished for a simple caring mother
who’d comfort her hurts and leave it at that.
I can’t let her know. Her fuss would be worse than the bruise.
She moved slowly to the kitchen, and staring at the contents
of the refrigerator, pulled out three different large fruit-juice
bottles and drank them all before stumbling back to bed.
T he reports on the host’s health weren’t good. Wholesale cell
necrosis marked an impact site trauma. There were two
bone fractures, one lower rib and one vertebra, as well as
numerous other minor injuries.
Organizers conferred, but there were no datastores among
them that contained data on this bipedal life form. The datastore
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Extreme Makeover
index pointed to more information on mammalian data, but
without pulser contact, there was no way to access it.
Still, planet Earth multicellular life had many common
features. Smiths would be needed, in greater quantities, to
manufacture the necessary bioactive chemicals this host body
would need to repair itself. Assemblers were given the orders
and new smiths began to be created.
Raw materials were a significant bottleneck. The host would
have to provide them, but host-control was also missing in the
local datastores. Thus far, smiths had managed to trigger a thirst
response, but that was all.
B ryony broke away from Terrian at the entrance to the high
school and bounced over to the driveway.
“Hello, Deena. I didn’t think you’d make it today. Hello,
Mrs. Brooke.”
Deena moved carefully out of the car, and didn’t object
when Bryony grabbed her bag for her. Morning had brought a
welcome numbness to her back. She could still feel a twinge, but
it was manageable. The bruise was ghastly, but no one knew
about that but her.
Mom had her last word, “Deena, you call me if you have any
problems. We don’t know if you have any hidden injuries.”
Deena nodded and sent her off. Bryony linked arms with her
and headed for the cafeteria. “Claire is just dying to hear all about
your brush with death. You’ve just got to tell her all the details.”
L uther pulled his Chevy into the post office parking lot,
waved at Postmaster Poat at the desk, and went to Box 635.
Inside was a yellow slip notifying Katy Ferril that she had a
10
Integration
registered letter. He waited in line for just a minute while Mrs.
Ohlinger bought some flower print stamps.
“Good morning Luther. I see your aunt has another of those
letters from her agent. Good news I hope?”
He smiled. “Most of the time it is.” He signed the form as an
authorized representative for his aunt, smiled and left.
At the bank, he opened the anonymous looking envelope
and removed the check. $16,442.80. That was good. He was
running short of cash. He endorsed it. His signature was on file
for Aunt Katy’s account. The clerk smiled and warned him that
the funds would be on hold several days while the check cleared.
He had heard it so many times before. He just nodded.
Down three blocks, he stopped at a different bank’s ATM
and pulled out the last $300 of the account’s free balance. It
would have to last him the waiting period. He should never have
let it get this close.
B y the time classes started, Deena had told her story three
times. I’m not a good storyteller.
Claire Winters was obviously disappointed she hadn’t
experienced a great spiritual revelation when facing death. So,
when she told the same story to Stella Fender, she made up an
ominous foreboding right before the lightning strike. Stella didn’t
buy it. Deena realized she didn’t either. Then, when Rosemarie
Woodruff heard the tale, she wasn’t interested in Deena’s story at
all. She was aghast at the horrible destruction suffered by the tree.
At lunch, as she struggled without success to keep to her
diet, she overheard the guys talking. They were concerned about
the tree, too.
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Extreme Makeover
L uther sketched out the scene on one of the brown paper
napkins that proudly proclaimed how environmentally
friendly they all were by using recycled paper.
“It’s a hundred feet long and it fell right across the West
Ridge Trail. That’s a well-used trail. And face it—a log that size
just cannot be moved. The park rangers will either have to extend
the trail around the edge of the log, or else they’ll have to slice
out a section of the log to let the existing trail pass through.
“That’s the solution I’m hoping for.”
He leaned forward. “Just think! No ordinary chainsaw could
cut through a log that thick. They’d have to haul out the big iron.
And then, when they’re done, there will be a freshly cut giant log
right on the trail. I would love to be there when they cut it.”
Judd Hansel shook his head. “Do you think they will do it
soon? Boy, I would have loved to be there with you guys when it
fell.”
Terrian grinned. “The whole ridge shook with the impact
when it crashed. I’m really surprised Deena Brooke is still alive,
as close as she was.”
“I think I’ll call the state park people,” decided Luther. “I
know they’ll have to do something soon, or people will start
bushwhacking their own way around it, like we had to. Park
rangers hate it when people start making their own trails!”
D eena was handed an office slip when she arrived at Spanish
class. “Report to Nurse Perkinson.”
She tensed. The day had been going well. The muscle
stiffness had eased. She dared hope that she could just wait it out,
give the bruises a few days to heal, and everything would be back
to normal.
12
Integration
Sharlene, as she wanted everyone to call her, was the school
counselor and nurse. She smiled and went to the door as Deena
knocked.
“I just heard about your accident, Deena—no one ever tells
me anything. Come sit down.”
So, Deena told the story again. This time without any
feelings at all, not even her icky brush with tree sap.
“I can’t imagine that,” Sharlene the councilor said. “It must
have been frightening. Did you dream about it?”
Deena had to think about that one. She should have—she
had a recurring dream of falling when she had been six and they
moved to their current home, only a block or so from the sea
cliffs.
But last night, she had gone deeply to sleep, and except for
raiding the refrigerator, slept soundly through the night.
“I guess not.” She shrugged. “I was bone tired. Mom had to
wake me up.”
Sharlene nodded, and Deena had a sudden suspicion. Mom
set this up.
Sharlene tapped her pencil and asked, “Would you mind if I
checked you out for injuries?”
“Why?”
Sharlene looked at the papers on her desk, “Oh, it’s probably
a good idea, just in case there is something you might not have
noticed. It’s best to catch these things early.”
It was Mom. They had no health insurance. If she could get
Deena a medical checkup for free, with even the possibility of the
school system paying for any needed treatement to avoid a
lawsuit, that would be even better.
“I don’t think it’s necessary. I have a few aches and bruises,
but they’re nothing. I don’t want to take up your time. Besides, I
really need to get back to class.”
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Extreme Makeover
The nurse pursed her lips. In the absence of an actual in-
school injury, her medical authority was limited.
“Hmm. Well, could you ease my mind just a little bit? Let me
check your range of motion—little things like that. It won’t take
long.”
Deena reluctantly stood up and went through the twists and
stretches as directed.
It was as if something clicked. As she bent her back, the last
of the stiffness just vanished.
“Wow. That feels wonderful.” She hadn’t felt this limber in
years. Was this what chiropractors offered?
Sharlene did a superficial search for cuts and bruises, but
couldn’t find any.
“I really gotta get back now.”
“Okay, Deena. Your lucky stars must have been shining
yesterday. I can’t find anything wrong with you.”
O rganizers adjusted task force priorities. Nothing was
working out easily. Individual organizers were not that
smart, only in large collections could they orchestrate complex
tasks.
The best they could do now was to proceed step by step.
Without orders, they should self-destruct. To get orders
they needed more pulsers. To make more pulsers, the
assemblers needed unavailable raw materials. Sending miners
out to find the missing elements would be a task more gigantic
than humans sending a spacecraft to another planet. It was
clearly impossible for this tiny collection.
So, the host had to find the raw materials or else there was
no hope.
14
Integration
Organizers turned their focus entirely to host management.
Repair damage to the host. Find any method to influence the
host’s will. Make the host hunt for the needed raw materials.
Sensors were scanning the entire range of chemical and
electrical signals in the host body. Currently, they were riding the
host blindly, unable to sense the host’s environment, and unable
to make any but the most elementary influence on its brain.
But with more data, that would change.
W aiting outside the cafeteria entrance, Deena glanced at the
clock visible through the window. It was already past the
hour. Mom was late. Every day, she was late. When Deena
complained, Mom was contrite and promised to do better, but it
never helped. Lately, she just said nothing. Mom was just built
that way, with no sense of time.
Some days, the extra time gave her a chance to finish off
homework assignments. She didn’t feel like it today. She sat on
the wide log railing and waited.
The spring air was clear today, with no hint of the rains that
had plagued them for a week or more. If they’d held off on the
field trip one more day, then she would never have had her
‘adventure’.
The only good thing about an adventure was the stories it
gave you. But telling her story hadn’t helped, not in any real
sense. She was still here, sitting by herself, while Bryony’s real
circle of friends were off across the football field practicing their
drill-team dance steps.
Clattering down the road, a trio of skate-boarders were
heading for sidewalks unknown, and on the field, she saw Bill
Jaeger racing around the track.
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Extreme Makeover
Suddenly, Luther and Terrian left the building. If they saw
her, they gave no sign. She was used to being invisible. Boys
never made eye contact. Their gaze just swept past her.
“They weren’t anxious to tell me when,” said Luther.
“But you’re sure they’re going to cut it?”
“Yes. They don’t want anyone around while they’re doing
the deed, I bet. Tarnish their image or something.”
Terrian nodded. “My uncle was a lumberjack, back during
the protest days. He told me some things about cutting the big
trees. I’d love to see it for real.”
“Me too. That’s why I’m going back there Saturday. Want to
come along?”
“Sure. Maybe Bill would come too.”
“Naw. He has a track meet.”
Deena stood up and stepped closer.
“I want to come.”
The guys were almost as shocked as she was. Staying quiet
and out of sight was the way she lived. She never intruded into
other’s conversations. And these were guys!
“I mean,” she struggled with the words. “I mean, I was
distracted...at the time. I want to see the tree. The one that hit
me. I want to see it again.”
Luther glanced at Terrian and then said, “Ah, sure. I’ve got
room. I’ll come by here Saturday morning, say eight?”
Deena nodded, and then escaped before she started
babbling, or worse, started blushing.
What did he mean, she thought suddenly, that he had enough
room? Was that a fat crack?
16
Chapter 3: Tropism
D eena looked behind her through the rear window. The guys
were still talking as Mom drove off. What had she gotten
herself into?
“Mom?”
“Yes, Deena. How was school today? Did you have any
aches and pains?”
“No. I got a clean bill of health from the school nurse.”
Mara Brooke sniffed. She could only trust the school’s nurse
if some problem had been found.
“In fact, Mom, I feel great. That hike through the forest
must have done me a lot of good. I need to do more hikes like
that.”
“Well, I certainly would have something to say about that. It
sounds like a very dangerous place—somewhere I wouldn’t want
my daughter.”
Deena sagged. That didn’t go well. It would do no good now
to ask permission to join Luther’s Saturday expedition.
Why did I even ask him in the first place?
Every time she looked south, something inside her wanted
to go back. She liked the place, in spite of the accident, in spite of
the heat and humidity.
But Mom had spoken. She would just have to beg off the
trip. I bet Luther and Terrian will be glad to hear that.
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Extreme Makeover
T hey were making progress. Connection had been made to
the optic nerves, and firm data on the day-night cycle had
been established. Using sensor reports on the exact moment of
sunrise, the organizers had determined that the new host was
now several miles north of their previous host, the damaged
tree. Once they could nail down sunrise and sunset times over
several days, they should be able to locate the new host to a far
greater precision.
This new host was demonstrating a significant ability to
travel, much greater than had the other mammalian hosts that
had been sampled. This potential only confirmed that they
should continue their plan—repair the host and learn to control
it.
A magnetic sensor grid was established, and the order had
been given to the smiths: Feed endorphins into the blood stream
when the host’s eyes were pointed south. Defocused pleasure
was a crude way to influence a host, but it was a start.
B efore school the next day, Deena checked her back again,
and was relieved that the bruises were almost gone. They
must have been superficial, and late night worries had made them
seem worse than they were.
“Mom! It’s time to go.” Deena hesitated at the front door,
her bag in hand. It was a mistake to go on out to the car. ‘Just a
minute’ in her mother’s mind could easily last an hour.
“Mom! It’s time to go.” Constant irritation seemed to be the
only thing that worked.
Mara showed up a couple of minutes later, keys in hand.
“Are you ready yet?” she asked her daughter.
18
Tropism
B ryony swung up behind her in the hallway on the way to
class.
“I just heard about the Saturday trip to the forest. I’m
coming too. Claire is so jealous! But Luther said he only had
room for four people. I’m so glad you’re coming. Maybe it won’t
be raining this time.”
Deena only had time to nod before Bryony spotted another
friend and was off to share the news.
Luther saw her too, and waved. Deena smiled. It was the
first time a guy recognized that she existed in years.
But what do I do now? Mom wouldn’t ever change her mind.
L uther waved at the timid girl. He was a little relieved, now
that Bryony had been added to the party.
In the year he had been in Crescent City, he had played his
social interactions closely and carefully. His goal was simple. He
wanted to be the ‘nice young man’ adults trusted, but never gave
a second thought. Just get through the year and get a standard diploma
with ‘Luther Jennings’ printed on it.
He’d never intended to stay here beyond graduation. He
didn’t want a job. He didn’t want a girlfriend. He didn’t want any
teacher to take a serious interest in his future.
And he certainly didn’t want to get entangled in any scandal.
Timid girls could be perfectly sane, hiding wonderful
personalities under the surface. But they could be disturbed, too.
He had no way of knowing.
Deena Brooke had been in his physics class all year. She
rarely spoke in class, but then, neither did he. He hadn’t really
been aware of her until the tree accident. She was just a
background character.
19
Extreme Makeover
He should have turned her down when she tried to invite
herself along on the trip. ‘Guys only’ was a legitimate excuse. But
her plea had made perfect sense at the time.
Once he said ‘Yes’, he was committed. He didn’t want to be
anyone’s best friend, but he didn’t want any enemies either. High
school social interactions were a minefield. It was so easy to say
the wrong thing and scar someone’s personality for life.
But Deena was a mystery, and mysteries had to be contained,
for his own safety. One thing he’d learned from two years of
constant monitoring of the news was that a claim of rape from a
frustrated teenage girl was like the bullet from a gun. No matter if
it were false. No amount of after-the-fact analysis or justification
could call it back, or undo the damage it caused.
Maybe he was just being paranoid, but being paranoid had
saved his life twice thus far.
Taking Deena off to the forest unchaperoned was too
dangerous. Having Terrian along wasn’t much help.
But Bryony! That was different. Her life story, with all the
intricate details, was available at the drop of a hint. If anyone had
any doubts about the outing, Bryony could supply a minute-by-
minute transcript, and everyone knew it. Just having her along
made the whole event innocent.
“U m, Luther?” He looked up from his desk.
“Hello, Deena.”
She looked around the room, nervously. “I... I realize that I
was really out of line when I asked to come along on your trip.
It’s okay if you would rather take someone else. I’ve heard
that....”
He shook his head. “No, that’s fine. You’ve got a better
reason for going than I do. We’ve got our four, and I’d rather not
get into juggling passengers if I can avoid it. You are very
20
Tropism
welcome to come, and I’ll expect to see you Saturday morning,
okay?”
She nodded. “Okay.”
A single pulser could to nothing. Designed to build up an
electric charge, and then release it in a time scale only a
molecular scale machine could achieve, the radio waves emitted
by one pulser was a blip of static at best.
Organized into arrays, orchestrated to pulse with a co-
ordination that was almost prescient, a collection of pulsers
could send coded signals great distances.
Sensors monitoring the static charges maintained by other
pulsers could detect incoming signals.
But not this time. Every eighty-plus seconds, since the time
they had entered the new host, organizers had checked for any
response to their call for assistance. But with their numbers so
few, their coded transmission was weak. Any signals from other
hosts were too faint to be processed from existing random
noise.
But nanobots were machines, not given to hope, or to
despair. Organizers added up the numbers. The analysis tilted
more towards shutdown each iteration. But it hadn’t reached
that threshold yet.
D eena waited on the railing for her mother to come pick her
up.
She looked again toward the south. It wasn’t all that far, for
people with cars like Luther. Under the tall trees was another
world, and it called to her.
21
Extreme Makeover
“I really want to go,” she whispered. But without her
mother’s help, she couldn’t even get to the school tomorrow
morning to join the party.
Noise from the track field caught her attention. Female
voices cheered as Bill raced by again. Gossip she’d overheard
mentioned that in the last track meet, he was setting a pace to
break the district record in the 1600-meter race.
Not that she would ever be there for a track event. Athletics
and she parted company many years ago.
Coach Rathborne was in another part of the field urging her
relay team to work on the baton passing. A missed pass had cost
them the race during the last track meet and she didn’t want the
same thing to happen tomorrow morning.
Deena squinted her eyes and looked harder at the girls’
coach. She set her books down and trudged across the field.
Track never made much sense to her. There were too many
different things going on, all at the same time. The big guys were
off in the corner throwing heavy things. The different runners
were waiting for the other guys to get out of the way so they
could do their thing. And where did the spear throwers fit in? It
definitely didn’t count as ‘organized sport’ in her mind.
“Coach Rathborne?”
The coach had also been her Biology instructor several years
ago. She had looked old then. Today, in her shorts, with her
whistle, she looked so thin that the wind could pick her up and
carry her away. But girls’ gossip called her tough, so go figure.
“Yes, Deena. What do you need?”
Deena looked around the field hesitantly. “Well, I was
wondering if you needed any help at the track meet tomorrow?”
The coach looked her over, and then cocked her head. “I’ll
never turn down an extra hand. We can always use someone to
keep track of the statistics. Sure. I’d be glad to have you come
along. The bus will be leaving at seven in the morning.”
22
Tropism
Deena smiled, feeling like her every gesture must be
betraying her. “Fine. Uh, could I ask a favor? My mom doesn’t
know about this yet. Could you give her a call, so she’ll know it’s
okay?”
L uther walked through his front door. The house was
relatively new, at the far end of the street. Out of sight, out
of mind, was his policy, even for a place to stay.
“Aunt Katy, I’m home!”
There was no answer, of course. ‘Aunt Katy’ lived eight
hundred miles away in Malibu.
He checked his tells—single strands of hair placed carefully
where any intruder would have to dislodge them. The one
guarding the empty jewelry box on the fireplace mantle had fallen
off, but the light layer of dust hadn’t been disturbed. He replaced
it with another from his scalp.
There was a path he followed twice a day, checking the
rooms. His bedroom, the living room and the kitchen were the
only places actually used. The others held the furniture
untouched from the day he’d rented the place. One of these days,
before the lease expired, he just might dust the room. Or maybe
not.
In the garage, he hauled out a bucket and hose and car wax.
It was time to wash his baby again. He would have guests for a
ride tomorrow.
A cross the street and down the block from Deena’s fifty-year-
old home, there was a park bench at the top of the cliff. She
often sat there, watching the people work their way down the
staircase to the beach.
23
Extreme Makeover
She even went down there herself, to walk among the
towering rocks and to see what the waves washed ashore.
However, the climb back up was a killer. Come to think of it, she
hadn’t gone down there in more than a year.
Watching the others was good enough.
The best time of day was sunset.
A cloudbank hugged the far horizon. The sun struggled to
penetrate the mass, showing Deena x-ray like details in darkness
and light.
I’m old enough to go places on my own, to do things with my friends.
Mom never wants to let go.
Would it have been any better if Dad had lived?
Probably not. All she could remember were the fights.
Looking back through her little-girl eyes, they hadn’t been a
happy family. That last year, he was gone more often than he was
home.
Mom was alternately kind to his memory, then sarcastic. The
best thing he did for their family, she said often, was to carry
good life insurance.
It was good enough to buy their little house and pay off their
debts. Every month, a pension check arrived from his company,
providing just enough so that Mom’s various jobs were never
more than short term hobbies—leaving her plenty of time to take
care of her daughter.
Well, Mom. The best thing you can do for me is to let me live my own
life.
The sun had gone down. With the clouds in the way, she
hadn’t caught the moment. But it was definitely getting dark now.
She got to her feet and headed home.
Her mother called to her as she came in. “Deena, you’ll
never guess who just called!”
24
Chapter 4: Evasion
“A re you sure you don’t want me to come along?”
“I’m sure, Mom.”
The yellow school bus was loading in the parking lot. Some
students were already on board. Coach Rathborne was over by
the gym.
“Mom. Drop me off here.”
Mara Brooke pulled to the curb. “I could take you closer.”
“No. This is fine. I have to get a book from my locker
before I join the group.”
“Okay. Do you have your lunch money?”
“Yes Mom.”
Mara frowned at the bus. “Now be careful, Honey. Stay clear
of the shot-put field. I don’t want you hurt again.”
“I’ll be okay.” Deena pulled her jacket out of the car. It was
already a warm day, but her Mom would worry all day long if she
didn’t take it.
“I’ll wait until....”
“No, Mom. I can take care of myself. Go on home. I’ll call
you when the bus gets back.”
“If it’s after dark....”
“I’ll call!”
Deena waited patiently on the curb until Mom drove off.
Her biggest worry was that she would see Coach Rathborne and
go over to chat.
She breathed a sigh of relief. I have to stay out of sight, too. The
coach wouldn’t wait for her, or give her a second thought when
25
Extreme Makeover
she didn’t show. Simply explaining that her mother had changed
her mind would be believable enough if she asked about it
Monday.
L uther was surprised to see everyone waiting for him when he
drove into the school parking lot, cautiously drifting over
the speed bumps. He eased the Chevy up to the curb.
Bryony skipped down the steps and made a dash for the
shotgun position. Terrian Trent and Deena took their time and
climbed into the back seat. Deena folded her jacket and held it on
her lap.
“Everybody ready?”
They drove off at an easy pace. Luther never exceeded the
posted speed and was especially cautious inside the city limits.
Local cops were more territorial than state police—more
sensitive to infractions.
Bryony ran her fingers over the dash. “This is a great car.
Where did you get it?”
Luther nodded. “I like it. Everything is original equipment. I
like the way it drives. A big V-8. I just wish it got better gas
mileage. It costs a fortune to keep it moving.”
Terrian asked, “Do we need to chip in for gas?”
“Naw. I was going there anyway. Costs the same for one
person as four.”
D eena listened to Bryony chatting on and on. Luther did
little but nod. He didn’t have much to say, unless she
talked about his car.
26
Evasion
Not that he isn’t interested in her. She saw his eyes. Bryony in her
crisp yellow tailored shirt and white pants was a vision both guys
liked to look at.
Deena shifted her folded jacket. I’m dressed like my mother. She
couldn’t have worn anything nicer than her faded blue sweats,
not to a track meet.
Terrian looked a little bored.
Oh, I should be talking to him. Isn’t that how it was supposed to
work?
She took a breath. “I don’t understand track meets.”
“Oh?” Terrian looked at her for the first time. “I like them.”
“You would.”
He looked puzzled.
She hurried on. “I mean, you are big. Muscular. Shouldn’t
you be out there throwing things?”
He nodded, looking pleased. “Yes. Last year I did shot-put
and hammer throw.” He rattled off some numbers. They meant
nothing to her.
“But honestly, I’m only interested in football. Track is a way
to stay in shape in the off-season.”
“You were good at it.” She actually meant it as a question,
but he agreed with her and began telling about the blocks he had
thrown, or something. Deena knew as little about football as she
did about track.
But all she had to do was say ‘Yes’ and ‘Um’ every so often
and Terrian would keep the conversation running single-
handedly. She was surprised how well it went.
L uther tuned Bryony out. He just enjoyed the driving. The
trees started just a few miles south of Crescent City. Once
27
Extreme Makeover
Highway 101 crossed over the Klamath River Bridge, he started
looking for his turn off. He hadn’t paid much attention on the
bus, but he knew roughly where the place was.
“Ah, there it is,” he mumbled. The Newton-Drury Scenic
Parkway turned off to the right.
From the back seat, Deena spoke, “It’s that way.” He
glanced back. She was pointing. It agreed with his memories too.
He relaxed as the Chevy eased through the twisty two-lane
blacktop road, sometimes flanked on either side by giant pillars of
living wood so close that there wasn’t a shoulder to speak of. It
was dark, although the day was sunny. The green canopy above
took every ray of sun for its own use.
“That way.” In the back seat, Deena was pointing off into
the trees.
“Unfortunately, there’s no road that way.” Luther joked.
Bryony and Terrian chuckled. Deena wasn’t paying attention. She
held her pointer finger out the window, like a live compass
needle, shifting her angle as they moved past.
“Right here,” she said.
Luther frowned. There was no way to pull off here, even if
Deena was right about the location. And she could be. It was in
roughly the right part of the road.
And then, the trailhead parking area—just a wide section of
shoulder—appeared over the next rise. He pulled off and turned
off the engine.
“This is the place the bus picked us up.”
Deena was out the door.
“Hey, I’ve got water bottles in the ice chest in the trunk. We
should get those.”
But Deena hadn’t heard him. She was already heading up
through the trees. Bryony looked concerned. Luther went to the
trunk.
“We’ll catch up to her. Don’t worry.”
28
Evasion
O rganizers were swamped with new reports as sensors all
over the host’s body were reporting signals, strong signals,
that indicated close proximity to the other hosts.
Their strategy had worked. Repair the host and point it in
the right direction. This host could travel great distances, and it
had done so.
But now wasn’t the time to let up. While they were much
closer to the other hosts, pulsers were still scarce. The host had
to be positioned very close before two-way communication
could be established.
D eena tripped over a tree root and went down on one knee.
“Ouch.”
It was a rude wakeup. As the car had entered the park area,
the grand array of redwood giants had seemed like a fairyland,
even more so than on the school field trip. Terrian’s replay of his
favorite football games faded away from her consciousness.
Vaguely, she remembered jumping out of the car, anxious to
reach it. Whatever ‘it’ was.
Like the trip her mother took her to Disneyland ages ago,
the trail through the trees seemed a gateway to Wonderland.
Overhead, the towering spires felt like old and wise giants. If she
could just get to the right place, perhaps they could speak to her.
Deena rubbed her knee. She was just being foolish.
Behind her, through the trees, she could hear Bryony’s
giggle. I need to learn how to do that. Guys just loved her giggle.
Quickly, she got to her feet. She couldn’t let them see she’d
fallen. She couldn’t bear to be rescued again.
“There she is!”
29
Extreme Makeover
Deena just waited for them to catch up. She was winded.
Maybe some people need to be in the lead all the time, but she’d
never been one of those. Whatever was calling her onward could
just wait a minute.
Bryony ran up and tapped her on the shoulder. “Tag, you’re
it.” She giggled and ran on.
Terrian trudged on, nodding to her, but intent on catching
up to Bryony.
Luther stopped and handed her a cold plastic water bottle.
“This is yours.”
She broke the seal and gulped the water greedily. “Thanks.”
He smiled. “Do you still know the direction?”
“Sure.” Instinctively, she pointed. It was off to the right of
the trail, but she had no intention of cutting through the tangle of
bushes, mossy logs and boggy streamlets. The trail would get
them close enough.
He nodded. “Come on, let’s try to keep up.”
They walked together until the trail ended at a T-junction.
Without hesitation, Deena headed to the right.
“I hope they went this way.” Luther looked back.
A voice in the distance quickly confirmed Deena’s choice.
“Wow!”
L uther increased his pace and over the next ridge, he saw the
fallen log.
Bryony and Terrian were standing in the gap, where a chunk
of the log had been cut out. The trail was rutted and scarred by
the machinery that had been brought in to do the cutting and
hauling.
The park rangers had cut out a six foot section of the log
and had rolled it out of the trail's path. Sawdust covered the
ground over the whole area. It was several inches deep in places.
30
Evasion
Side branches had been trimmed away from the trail, so there was
no obstruction.
He reached up and traced the growth rings on the cut face.
The resinous scent of the redwood was strong.
Terrian said, “It must have been cut yesterday. Look at all
these tracks. I’m really going to have to get my uncle to come out
here.”
Bryony asked, “Where’s Deena?”
Luther didn’t look up. “She was right behind me. She’ll be
here in a minute.”
With the palm of his hand, he started measuring the distance
from the bark to the center of the rings. He could get a rough
estimate of the age of the tree. It would take a long time to count
each and every ring.
“This is one hundred years ago.” He duplicated the span.
“This is two hundred years.”
Terrian interrupted his count. “Where is Deena? I don’t see
her anywhere.”
Luther looked back. She hadn’t been that far behind.
Bryony called out, “Deena!”
There was no answer.
31
Chapter 5: Connection
L uther was already at the log, his hand on the wood, when
Deena crested the rise. Trimmed of its side branches, she
got a good look at the size of the central trunk for the first time.
If that’d hit me, I’d be paste.
She paused. Something was wrong. There it was, the log that
they had all come to see.
But there was no pull from it.
For something this important in her life, she expected
something more significant, more magical. It was huge, massive,
and ancient. But it was just a big dead tree.
For the last few days, something mystical had been calling
her, she was sure of it. That was why she’d struggled so hard to
get here.
Something urged her to return here to the forest, to the tree
that almost killed her, she’d thought.
Well, it wasn’t the tree.
Eyes closed, she took a deep breath of the green life all
around her.
She spread her arms wide, trying to soak it all up.
There! She could feel it stronger in that direction. She twisted
where she stood, as if her arms were an antenna seeking out the
vibrations all around her.
She was sure. That way!
32
Connection
L uther frowned. He did not want problems right now.
Bryony looked worried. Terrian had walked back along
the trail, at least to the last rise where he’d left her. He shook his
head.
“Could she’ve gone back to the car?” he asked.
“But why?” asked Bryony.
Luther sighed. “Maybe seeing the tree brought back bad
memories. I don’t know. In any case, we have to find her.
“Bryony, stay here. Terrian and I are going to search for
her.”
She looked alarmed. “Both of you?”
He held up the fingers of one hand. “Five minutes. That’s
all. The trail branches back there. Terrian will take one branch, I’ll
go the other back as far as the car. You need to stay here in case
she just wandered off the trail and heads back. Okay?”
Hesitantly, she nodded.
He glanced at Terrian. No need to repeat. They headed back
along the trail at a jog. At the branch, he called out, “Five
minutes. No more.”
“Got it.” And they split up.
She wouldn’t have come this far. Deena had been obviously
winded right out of the car. She wasn’t on the trail. For some
reason, she’d gone into the bush.
He reached the road and one glance was enough to tell she
wasn’t there. He didn’t stop, just turning around and keeping to
his loose jog, suitable for the uneven ground.
On the way back, he noticed the spot where he’d caught up
with her the first time and given her water.
She had pointed off that way. Whatever the source of her odd
sense of direction, she had been intent on going on that vector.
Could she have taken a ‘shortcut’ and gotten lost?
33
Extreme Makeover
It was worth a shot. He sighted on a tree with an old fire scar
and stepped off the trail.
P ulser signals peaked. The organizers sent out the signal.
Stop the host.
Smiths shifted to producing a molecule that regulated sleep
in the host’s brain. The direction finder system that had been
feeding pleasure sensations into her brain was shut down.
Their weak signals were being read by the giant hosts in all
directions. For the first time since this host had been populated,
local organizers could connect with the vastly superior
intelligence provided by the matrix of hundreds of hosts, each
containing thousands of times more organizers.
The issue of what to do with the current host could be
resolved quickly.
M oving through the forest was not easy. The trails made a
big difference. Luther climbed over a different fallen log,
one nearly the size of the one they had come to see, but this one
must have fallen ages ago. The wood was entirely covered with
moss and other plants. His struggle had left black scrape marks
through the tangle of green.
At least, I’ll have no trouble finding my way back. But if he hated
to mess up the place, surely a park ranger would hate him doing
that too. He couldn’t have that. He needed to be more careful.
Nervously, he checked for his guide tree. Changing
directions every step made it easy to get lost out here.
Deena probably tried this, and got lost. At least he’d looked at the
map before coming here. If all else failed, he just needed to travel
east and he would reach the road again.
34
Connection
Hmm. Which way is east? It was hard to see the sky.
D eena was suddenly so tired that she could barely stand. She
put out her hand for support.
I need to rest.
The tree was old, with a great black scar that went down its
side from some forest fire hundreds of years ago. Redwoods were
tough, but many carried visible reminders of their ability to
survive.
Deena sat down on the moist ground and leaned her back
against the tree. Her eyes closed.
For a few moments, highlighted by a single bird’s call, there
was no motion other than the slow creep of a sunbeam that
managed to make its way down to the forest floor. Then, oozing
from the bark, a gray blob, like a thick liquid, formed on the
surface just above her head.
Gravity took over from there, and it plopped down into her
hair.
She jerked slightly, as if acting out a dream, but it wasn’t
enough to wake her.
U h, oh. Luther looked from one fire-scarred tree a few
hundred yards ahead of him, to the other blackened
giant off to his left. Maybe he should have paid more attention to
details. Now that he looked closely, there were many trees that
bore marks of a forest fire.
Of course. Probably all were marked in the same fire.
He stopped moving. Think it through. If I get lost, and the park
rangers find me, someone is sure to want to talk to my parents. I can’t have
that.
35
Extreme Makeover
Slowly, he turned, examining his surroundings in detail. Off
in the distance, he could see where he had climbed over a log.
That was his way out. He could backtrack.
But Deena was still missing.
“Deena!” he called. Sound couldn’t carry well here, but he
had to try. Double-checking his direction, he stepped ahead a few
paces and called again.
What was that? His head turned sharply to the right.
Something moved.
“Deena!”
There it was again. Partially obscured by the ferns, he could
see something blue.
Taking giant steps over the uneven ground, he moved closer.
It was Deena, slumped against a tree. His heart raced when
he saw a dark, glistening patch on her head.
“Deena!” She moved. At least she was alive. If her head was
bleeding, he needed to stop it fast.
Quickly, he reached her side. She was unconscious.
“Deena?” He shook her arm.
She mumbled, and took a deep breath, waking up.
“Ah. Luther?” She looked confused.
He was too. He touched the top of her head, but there was
no sign of blood.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
He pulled his hand away. “I was just worried about you. You
went missing. We’ve been looking for you.”
S he had been dreaming, but like most dreams, she couldn’t
remember what it had been about—not after waking up with
black haired, blue-eyed Luther hovering over her.
He helped her to her feet. Her hand in his felt like it was
burning.
36
Connection
“I’m sorry,” she blurted out. “I was just...I don’t even
remember. I didn’t mean for you to worry.”
He smiled. “It’s okay. I’m just glad you’re okay.” He looked
around. “Now we have to find our way back.”
“Oh, we’re not far. The log is just over there.” She pointed
back the way she had come. She waited for him to start, and he
was waiting for her.
“Go ahead,” she said. He hesitated and then led the
way—giving her the opportunity she needed to quickly brush the
mud and decayed leaves off the seat of her pants.
She caught up quickly. It was slow going. He smiled back at
her, and every time he did that, she caught her breath.
Don’t go giddy over the guy. He was nice, and concerned about
her, but that didn’t mean anything. She wished it did.
He stopped and put out his hand.
“Wha...” he gestured for her to be quiet. She followed his
gaze, and saw the deer. Motionless, with great liquid eyes, it was
less than a dozen feet away, watching them intently.
The three of them waited, none of them moving.
Luther then whispered, “Let’s move on.”
She followed. The deer just watched them pass on by.
“They usually spook,” he said after they had moved on a
little farther. “Deer here must be used to humans.”
P ast a pair of great trees that had grown up side by side, so
close they were now touching, she heard Bryony’s giggle.
Luther picked up the pace, and around another tree, they could
see the trail.
Bryony and Terrian were sitting up on the top of the log,
dangling their feet off the edge of the cut, chatting away about
something. Terrian spotted them. He pointed. “Ho there.”
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Extreme Makeover
Luther waved. Through another clump of ferns, they
reached the trail.
“I see you found her.”
“Yes. She was off that way taking a nap.”
Bryony giggled. “Sleeping Beauty off in the Enchanted
Forest.”
Terrian grinned. “Hey Luther, did you wake her with a kiss?”
“You want to walk back to town, Trent? If you’ll excuse me,
I still have some rings to count.”
Bryony wanted down. Terrian hopped off the log, and held
out his arms for her. They both enjoyed the assist.
“Deena, where have you been?” Bryony came over and took
her arm. Terrian watched them go, and then ambled over to
where Luther was hunched over, examining the wood closely.
They walked a little way back on the trail. Bryony whispered,
“What have you been up to?”
Deena shook her head. “Nothing. I just wandered about and
then fell asleep.”
“Then why are you blushing?”
Deena put her fingers to her cheek. “Oh. I’m just hot. Aren’t
you hot?”
Her friend looked at her patiently, “Not that hot.”
T he girls walked back to see how the counting was going.
Luther looked up. “I counted from this side. Terrian is
counting from the other. We’ll see if we match.”
Terrian shushed them. “I’m working here!”
In another minute, he said, “Done.”
Luther looked at the girls. “Would you care to guess how old
this log is before we reveal our counts?”
Bryony giggled, “Two thousand years!”
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Connection
Deena shook her head. “Not that old. I’d guess one
thousand one hundred and fourteen.”
Luther frowned. He turned to Terrian.
“Close! Wow. I counted one thousand one hundred and
ten.”
Luther nodded. “And I got one thousand one hundred and
twelve. Were you counting from over there? How could you see
the rings?”
Deena shook her head. “No, that was just a guess. Don’t
mind me.”
“Good guesser.”
T hey took a slow pace back to the car.
“We could make a historical plaque,” suggested Terrian.
“This is where the entire senior class was almost wiped out.”
“That’s an exaggeration,” Bryony scolded.
“Oh, we needn’t be so obvious.” Luther explained, “Just say
that on this date, the tree came down in the middle of a hiking
group of students. Which is sort of true. I was on this side of it.
Deena was on the other.
“The way history works, in a decade or so, a dozen people
will have been killed.”
They laughed, but then Deena poked Luther in the side and
pointed.
Down the trail, thirty feet ahead of them, a bull elk was
standing in their way.
Bryony eeked.
“Hold still,” said Luther. He looked at the fierce array of
antlers and looked around on the ground for a stick or a rock.
Terrian moved to the front. The girls moved back.
“Hey!” shouted Terrian. Then to Luther he asked,
“Shouldn’t he run off?”
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Extreme Makeover
“We saw a deer earlier. I think they must be pretty tame
here.” He looked at Terrian and asked, “Do you think you can hit
it with your water bottle?”
He hefted the half-filled container. “I’m a batter, not a
pitcher. But I’ll try.”
The elk stayed motionless until the bottle hit him on the
shoulder. With a bellow, it jumped off into the underbrush.
Quickly, it was out of sight.
“Poor thing,” said Bryony.
“Good throw.” Luther slapped him on the back. “Now let’s
get moving.”
Bryony joined Terrian. “You don’t think he was hurt, do
you?”
“Ha. Just startled. That thing was massive! I don’t think I
could have hurt it with anything less than a cannon.”
“Well, it scared me.”
They were still talking when the two of them got into the
back seat together. Deena hesitated, then got into the front seat
beside Luther.
Did she imagine it, or did Bryony grin at her?
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Chapter 6: Estrangement
W hen the pulser signals dropped out, the organizers shifted
to a new strategy. The host had left the area before the
reconfiguration could be completed. The most important
addition, new orders, had been absorbed, but they were still
resource limited. The organizer caste was now eight times
larger, but only half of the datastores made it through the host’s
skin before the process was interrupted.
Other critical additions, more pulsers, more assemblers,
element organelles, smiths, sensors—if the host could have
been kept still for a day or more, all of those could have been
installed.
The social environment of this type of host had been
misjudged. Other mammalian hosts under their control watched
the new host, and the others of her species, as their actions
played out. From the moment of interruption, this host had never
been allowed to be isolated from others of its kind.
The main question remained—should the host be
influenced to return for more restocking, or should the primary
orders be pursued immediately? They had datastores, they had
assemblers. With the right raw materials, all of the other castes
of nanobots could now be constructed. It would just take time.
“W ho’s hungry?” Luther asked as they re-joined Highway
101 at the south end of the scenic drive. He had
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Extreme Makeover
switched off the radio. Too much static so far from town, he
assumed.
There was a chorus of agreement.
Terrian said, “I know a burger place in Orick.”
“Good enough.” Luther turned south.
Deena felt odd. It was nice riding up in the front with
Luther. What was strange was that she should be jittery with
nerves. This was as close to a date as she could remember. After
that fiasco in the eighth grade where her mother arranged with a
neighbor’s son to take her to a dance, she had avoided situations
like this. Better to be ignored at home than to be ignored at a
party.
Would she have tried so hard to come along on this trip if
she’d known she would be paired up with a guy? For that matter,
why had she wanted to come in the first place?
“You know,” said Luther, “there were a couple of places in
the tree rings where I couldn’t tell if there was one ring or two.
Your number might have been the correct one.”
She shrugged. “Honestly, it was just a number out of the
blue. I didn’t think about it.”
In the back seat, Bryony was proving that she knew how to
talk to a football player better than Deena. Bryony knew the
games Terrian was talking about. They were excitedly talking
plays and runs.
Deena preferred talking to Luther. But did they have
anything in common to talk about?
L uther drove all the way through Orick before he turned back
and found the burger place Terrian mentioned.
He chuckled. “Sorry, I was expecting a chain fast food
place.” He looked down the street and back at the one-woman
operation. “This is hardly the Strip.”
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Estrangement
They each ordered and waited for the lady to cook them up.
The four sat down at the open-air picnic table and waited. There
was no indoor seating.
“What’s the Strip?” asked Bryony.
Luther looked shocked. “Las Vegas. You know the Strip,
where all the big casinos are? It’s a street. Las Vegas Boulevard.
You’ve seen pictures on TV. All lit up with a million lights. It’s
got everything from luxury hotels to casinos to hole-in-the-wall
tourist shops. And burger places, too.”
“Oh, I’d like to see that. So, you’ve been to Las Vegas?
What’s it like?”
He saw three sets of eyes focused on him.
“Um. Ah. Well, that was a few years ago. I really don’t
remember much.”
Terrian sniffed. “Like I believe that! Come on. Tell us.”
In truth, his memories were all too vivid. For him, it hadn’t
been a wonderland.
“Well... It was like the movies in some ways. The casinos are
all brightly lit inside, day and night. If you want to go to your
hotel room or to a show in a casino, they have it arranged so that
you have to walk through a jungle of slot machines before you
can even find the place you want to go. I think they deliberately
want you to get lost inside.”
“To take your money.”
He nodded at Deena. “Right. And outside it’s much the
same. The casinos are lit up to attract your attention. And the
street is littered with paper.”
Bryony frowned, “Why?” Littering was not high on her
favored activities.
Luther blushed. “Well, it’s advertisements, mainly.”
“Fliers and such?”
“Right.”
“Advertising what?”
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Extreme Makeover
Luther felt trapped. He really didn’t want to be in this
conversation. But how to get out of it? These were just kids. How
do you describe dozens of dirty bums hired to hand out colorful
picture cards to all the tourists walking the sidewalk—cards with
photos of the prostitutes with their phone numbers and going
rates? Most of those cards were immediately dropped to the
sidewalk when the tourist, or his wife, realized what they were.
“Anything is for sale in Las Vegas. Did you know they have
car rental places on the Strip where you can rent every expensive
sports car you can imagine? Just so you can drive the Strip in a
Ferrari Spider or Porsche Boxer or a Shelby Cobra.”
“Wow, I’d like to try that,” said Terrian.
“Take lots of cash. How about $500 for five hours, plus a
dollar a mile.”
Terrian winced.
Luther relaxed. Distraction worked. Just talk about the
dazzle and ignore the slime. He looked at the girls. “Did you
know they have a drive-thru wedding chapel?”
A fter eating, they drove south out of town to the beach that
formed a dike between Freshwater Lagoon and the ocean.
“I used to walk the beach all the time, when I was little.”
Deena turned her face into the cool breeze that blew in, still
smelling of salt and seaweed.
Luther stopped to pick up a pure white agate from the black
pebbly beach. “Did you ever do any surfing?”
She laughed. “I barely got my toes wet. The water is cold,
and Mom was always too afraid I would get caught in an
undertow.”
He picked up a palm-sized flat rock and tossed it hard out
into the incoming surf. It skipped once, then vanished.
“You always paid attention to your mom?”
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Estrangement
“Don’t laugh, but mostly, yeah. She was always there. It was
hard to be bad.” Deena tried not to think of those epic battle of
wills they’d waged over the years. Battles she was always destined
to lose. She was powerless and dependent.
“How about now? You’re not a little girl anymore.”
“We debate things more. I’ve gotten stubborn over the
years.”
When she looked at his face, she was surprised to see how
dark and gloomy he looked.
“How about you? How did you cope with parents?”
Luther shook his head. “They’re not here anymore. I live
with my aunt.”
He pointed down the beach, where the river emptied into
the surf. “It looks like Terrian and Bryony have found something.
Let’s go check it out.”
B y the time they loaded Bryony’s driftwood and Luther’s
rocks into the Chevy, Deena was having a hard time staying
awake. She regretted driving away from the cool breeze, but it
was time to head on home.
The guys rode in front this time. Bryony nudged Deena.
“How has your day gone?” she asked in a low voice.
Deena shrugged. “Nice. It’s been...I don’t know...spiritual.”
“Spiritual! What does that mean?”
Deena shook her head. “I really enjoyed the forest.”
“What about Luther? What did you guys talk about on the
beach?”
Deena smiled. “Nothing.”
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Extreme Makeover
L uther adjusted his rear-view mirror so he could easily see the
people in the back seat. Both of the girls had gone to sleep.
Terrian beside him was nodding his head in time with the music
on the radio.
I can’t do this again. He’d spent the whole year being invisible,
and in one Saturday outing, he had revealed more about his past
than he had in his whole stay in Crescent City.
What is worse, he had learned too much about them, too.
He had to keep hiding who he was, and who his father had
been.
The memory of Dad gave him a wink and a nod. He had
always dressed sharp, always on top of things. Dad loved him,
and he...he still couldn’t forgive his father’s ghost.
He tried to shake free of the memories. Bad dreams still
came to haunt him, but not usually during the day.
In the mirror, Deena stirred, as if she were having a dream.
Outside, he was passing through a meadow surrounded by the
trees. A herd of elk watched the car passively. Two other cars
were parked on the shoulders. Families were out taking pictures
of the animals.
This happened every day. In this place, humans weren’t
hunting them. They were just an annoyance, not something to be
feared. No wonder they seemed so tame.
That’s what I want to be. Just an annoyance at worst. Don’t fear me.
Don’t think about me. I’ll go away soon.
T errian adjusted the radio’s dial. “I wish this thing was digital.
I can never get it tuned right.”
Static marred the distant station’s music.
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Estrangement
“Be glad you can find music at all,” Luther said. “Most of
AM stations have gone to an all-talk format.”
“You need to get a new radio.”
“They didn’t make fancy digital FM radios in 1957.”
Luther noted the trailhead parking place as they passed by.
He would come back here again. There were plenty of trails to
hike. Maybe that’s what he needed—some time alone in the
forest with no one around. Some time where he could be himself,
not Luther Jennings.
“D eena. Wake up.”
She pulled sluggishly out of a dream. “Okay,
Bryony, I’m awake.” She rubbed her eyes. They were already in
town, approaching the school.
Just another weird dream. It had been that way lately—no
dreams about missing homework or being unprepared for a test.
Not even the one about falling off the cliff. Just dreams she
couldn’t even classify, gone in seconds after coming awake.
Luther pulled into the parking lot. “Deena, your mother’s
here for you.”
Deena was suddenly very awake. She looked out the
window. Her mother was standing besides their old tan Impala,
arms crossed. She could see the storm clouds on her face.
“Deena Brooke! You get out of that car.”
Her friends were very silent. Luther put on the parking
brake. He got out his door at the same time Deena opened hers.
Mara Brooke had her fists on her hips. “Where have you
been? I’ve had to call all your friends, trying to locate you.”
Deena’s sinking stomach dropped away even faster.
“I went to see your track meet. Imagine how I felt when
Coach Rathborne said you never showed up!”
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Extreme Makeover
Luther began, “We drove to the redwood park to see the
fallen tree and....”
Mara’s deadly gaze silenced his attempted intervention. She
took in all of their faces. Deena knew that look. Mom was
memorizing each of them.
“Deena get into the car!”
Bryony noticed Deena’s jacket still in the back seat, but she
didn’t have the courage to say anything.
M
that.
ara looked at her daughter’s sullen face as they drove off.
Deena had said nothing. It infuriated her when she did
“I’m very disappointed in you. I had thought you were more
mature than that. Can you imagine how worried I was?”
Deena looked a little flushed. Could she be sick?
When Deena looked back, Mara’s heart sank.
Her eyes are dilated. Could she have been taking drugs?
My dear little girl. What have they done to you?
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Chapter 7: Communication
D
minute.
eena retreated to her room. It wouldn’t keep Mom out for
long, but she had to have breathing room, if just for a
She changed out of her clammy sweats. Making her way into
the shower to get rid of the stink of the day, she slammed the
door and the glass in the cabinets rattled.
Why did she have to call everybody? Why did she go to the track meet
when I said I didn’t want her there?
In the shower, she could cry and it wouldn’t show.
Mom was stupid. She was invasive. She was callous. Mom
would ruin any chance she had of a social life in the blink of an
eye, and never even think about what she was doing.
And I messed up. It was a stupid plan. I thought I could get away with
it. I didn’t even think about whether it was wrong or not.
Now she had to face Coach Rathborne and all the other
mothers Mom had called. Everyone will know.
In her mind’s eye, she re-lived the scene. Mom yelling at her.
Luther’s look of pity. Her chance for making some real friends
burning up in an instant.
Anyone who knew her mother had the sense to steer clear of
Deena. Who would deal with her by choice?
S he went to bed early after a long session with her mother.
Deena said she was sorry, but Mara didn’t seem to hear that,
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Extreme Makeover
nor did it sink in when Deena sympathized with her mother’s
distress.
When it got to the third or fourth round of “Don’t you
realize how I felt...?” Deena claimed a headache and escaped.
She really did have a headache, but exhaustion put her to
sleep in minutes.
F or a large woman, Mara could move very quietly. She waited
outside Deena’s door until she could hear deep sleep
breathing, then slipped in.
Normally, she would wait until Deena was at school before
searching her things, but tomorrow was Sunday, and she
desperately needed to know whether her daughter had drugs.
Lifting slightly to muffle the sliding sound, she began at the
top dresser drawer.
D eena woke, feeling horrible. It was dark. She squinted at
her clock. 2:30 A.M.
Every muscle in her body ached. Her head ached. Dislodging
her cover, she shivered with a chill.
Eyes closed tight, sleep didn’t return. After a timeless bout
of shivering and tossing about on her bed to try to find a
comfortable position, she looked at the clock again. 3:13
I’ve got a fever. Deena breathed in. No sniffles. No intestinal
cramps.
It felt very much like the flu, but without all the symptoms.
She suffered in silence for another hour or so, and then
draped in her blanket, she went to the bathroom.
The thermometer read 103. There were a couple of tablets of
Tylenol left. She took them and tossed the bottle into the trash.
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Communication
A search of the datastores had provided valuable details on
connecting to the host’s senses. A new caste of sensors
was assembled from the designs in the datastores and took up
residence in the host’s brain.
While the nanobots couldn’t see in any human sense, they
could interpret visual nerve impulses into a model of the space
around them. For the first time, the organizers had information
about the host’s surroundings.
There were many on-going projects. They were out of
pulser range again, but there was now a clearly defined task to
increase the number of pulsers. There were several other tasks
to create the nanobot castes that would be necessary for the
overall project.
The host’s body encompassed a hive of activity.
This activity was generating heat.
Sensors were reporting a number of cellular imbalances due
to the shift in the host body’s temperature.
At first, when analysis had determined that the host’s
biological thermostat was located in the hypothalamus, they
attempted to reset the body’s desired temperature to one more
compatible with the nanobot activity level.
Unfortunately, this didn’t work either. The ‘fever’ setting had
its own set of side effects. Organizers began the task of
researching mammalian heat management in a more
comprehensive manner. It might be more expensive in
resources, but if that was what it took to keep the host body
healthy while supporting the nanobot activity, it would have to be
done.
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Extreme Makeover
W hen her fever broke, Deena was finally able to go back to
sleep. She woke at dawn, pleased to see that her
temperature was back near normal. Telling Mom that she
couldn’t go to church because she was sick would not have gone
over well.
They had a routine, and Deena would have been surprised if
this latest squabble would change that. Mom and she went to
church every Sunday.
All of her life was a routine.
Deena didn’t really expect any punishment for her trip. What
could her Mom really do? She always marveled at her friend’s
horrified reaction to ‘being grounded’. Grounding was only a
punishment if you had privileges to lose.
Deena didn’t go anywhere anyway. Other than lunch money
at school, she had no cash. The only times she’d thought about
getting a job, waiting tables at the coffee shop, Mom had vetoed
the idea. School work was more important.
And while there were a few friends like Bryony at school,
none were likely to invite her to go shopping or to see a movie.
I have no life.
M ara put the last minute touches on her hair before heading
off to church. That was when she noticed the pill bottle in
the trash.
I thought we were out of Tylenol. She felt a shiver. On TV, she
had seen a show where a boy had hidden his street drugs in
normal pill bottles, right in the family medicine cabinet. Had
Deena seen that show?
As they went out to the car, Mara looked at her daughter
carefully. She looked flushed.
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Communication
“How are you feeling, Honey?”
Deena shrugged. “Fine.”
T he church building was only a few blocks away, but they’d
never tried to walk it. It wasn’t their routine. Arriving a few
minutes before class, Mara located her regular parking spot.
“Deena!” Kerri Stuart waved at her. Deena walked over.
“Tell me.”
“About what?”
“The tree!” It seemed that even in other schools, the story of
the tree crash was making the rounds.
Deena repeated the story. It was getting old to her, but it was
fascinating to see how other people reacted to it.
“Then a few of us went back yesterday to see what the park
people had done to it. It was a nice day. I had more time under
the trees. It was comforting. It was as if the trees were looking
down at me, caring about me. I don’t know what to call it. It was
like a religious experience.”
M ara had been listening, catching enough of what Deena
was saying to confirm her fears. Deena had been
hallucinating in the forest.
She stalked away, hunting for the preacher.
Jeff Speer was talking to the song leader about what was
needed in the morning’s service when Mara caught up with him.
“I need to talk to you. It’s important.”
“Of course, Mrs. Brooke. Ken, just make your best guesses.
I’ll talk to you later.”
He opened the door to his office and invited her in.
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Extreme Makeover
“Jeff, I’m worried. I think Deena has gotten into drugs.” She
spilled out a rapid-fire narrative of the last couple of days.
He frowned, not really following her.
“Have you talked to Deena about this?”
Mara shook her head. “She doesn’t listen to me anymore.
She just puts on this blank face and nothing goes into her ears.”
Jeff’s fingers tapped the desk. “Deena has always been a help
here, especially when she assists with the Junior Service. The
younger ones like her a lot. Is this the first evidence you have
seen of possible drug use?”
“I just don’t know. I always try to look out for her, but she
has been so unhappy lately. I don’t know what more I can do for
her. I try to be a good mother.”
“And I’m sure you have. But what you need to do is to keep
the lines of communication open with her.
“If she has troubles in school or at home, she needs to know
that she can always bring them to you. For a young lady her age,
problems can seem impossible barriers. Hope can be very far off.
“She needs good friends, and a mother she can trust.
“Talk to her. And even more important, listen to every word
she has to say. Let her know that you are listening and care about
her worries.”
“Oh I do! I do!”
D eena noticed the sweet smell of the grape from the
communion trays, before the service even started. Scents
were strong today, and many of them were making her hungry.
But not all were pleasant. She had taken a shower before
coming, but if her own scent was strong enough to smell, what
could she do about it now? Her perfume had seemed off, a little
old, and she had done without it this morning. She wished she
had it now.
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Communication
But other people were a little strong today, too. Maybe it was
just her nose. She hoped so.
She saw her mom talking intently to Mrs. Moser.
Probably talking about me. Mom had a circle of friends that
would always tell her to go do what she had already decided.
Deena had seen the process before.
If any of her friends questioned Mara’s plans, they were cut
off. Deena would hear about the betrayal for weeks afterward.
Mom had lost half of her friends that way.
I bet they were relieved to go. I wish I could go.
She chided herself for that errant thought. She could never
abandon her mother. They were stuck together like glue, no
matter how painful it was.
S unday after church, routine called for a drive down to
Citizen’s Dock and a fish sandwich at their regular restaurant.
To Deena, with her sensitive nose, the place was alive with
new, appealing aromas.
“Mom,” she interrupted, right before Mara prepared to
order. “Mom, I’d like to try something different.”
“Okay.” She handed over the menu.
Deena sniffed deeply, finally ordering calf’s liver and onions,
with a side dish of broccoli. The flavors were strange, and
honestly not that appealing, but she quickly consumed every
scrap and begged for a dessert—a bowl of fruits and berries.
Mara watched with concern. Her eyes are dilated again. And her
skin looked flushed. She took her daughter’s arm.
“You have a fever. Let’s get home.”
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Extreme Makeover
anobot sensors monitored the host’s body temperature. It
was high, but well within functional levels. The influx of
needed raw material leached from the most recent meal allowed
assembler activity to notch several percent higher.
N Proof of the latest advance in host control, scent
renormalization let them use the host’s nasal detectors to their
fullest. Every scent was weaker the second time—that was the
way the host’s brain worked. Otherwise, the brain would be
continually swamped with data. It would be overloaded.
Important new data would be lost in the old, repetitive
experiences.
Renormalization, where smiths invaded the neural axons
and removed layers of learned data, returned the senses to their
highest pitch. It could be hard on the host, rehabituating to old
scents, but it gave nanobot sensors the best chance of
detecting the needed raw materials.
This trial was profitable, but it was limited. There were other
elements the assemblers needed. Better control techniques
would have to be developed, and soon. Orders had to be
obeyed.
BUY HERE
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