Red Ice

They called it the Blood Monster.

The term did not accurately describe the true nature or mechanisms behind the phenomenon, but it wasn’t meant to. It perfectly described the perception and feeling of the human beings who experienced it. Or rather, it glommed together the fears, anxieties, and revulsion experienced by those people.

Dylan carried the blood monster within him, but most nights he slept peacefully anyway. By this point he viewed the condition as a fact of life. This perspective became a necessity for any carrier who wished to live… well, any sort of life really. Carriers, like the rest of humanity, hoped for a normal life, of course, but no such thing had ever existed. And so, they learned to accept anything that approximated the collective cultural idea of normalcy.

Sure, Dylan slept on special rubberized sheets, but he did sleep, which is more than could be said for some carriers. And yes, rugs and carpet in the bedroom were entirely out of the question, as was any wall covering other than a very specific hemophobic paint. These days though, the paint could be had in a range of colors rivaling any ordinary latex, acrylic, or oil based varieties; which almost made up for the window that stayed open while he slept. All night, every night, no exceptions. He didn’t leave it open all the way, but even a crack in the Minnesota winter sent him into the closet for every spare blood-proof blanket he could find. By mid-October he hid nearly invisibly beneath the mound of covers, lamenting the necessary waste of his cheap space heater. Over time, these adjustments blended into the background of life for any carrier.

In some ways, Dylan knew no other life. The same precautionary measures adorned his parents’ bedroom long before he was born. His parents, however, had opted not to make such adjustments to his childhood bedroom, despite the blood tests and epigenetic analysis clarifying that Dylan did indeed carry the phenomenon as they suspected. Usually, they cited financial reasons. Other times they hoped he might be able to enjoy a normal childhood, though no such thing had ever existed. Truthfully, most parents of young carriers took this route because symptoms didn’t begin to show until adolescence, and so they couldn’t be bothered to fully remodel a room years before it was necessary. Besides, did the cost change whether it was done now or five years from now? No. So, why not wait until the time was right?

As with most such things, waiting for the right time turned into waiting until it became absolutely necessary.

No carrier ever forgot the first morning they woke to find a long, blood-stained trail leading from the sheets. On his first morning, Dylan found himself particularly drawn to the bottom edge of the windowframe. It looked like someone covered in sticky dark blood had been pulling in vain on the locked window in the hope of getting it open; a life-size, murderous spectre trying to escape, but too inept to do so. 

Nothing of the sort happened, of course.

The nanobots seeping out with his blood had, as individuals, no problem at all slipping out beneath the closed window. They passed between the weather-stripping seals with ease. As a collective however, they piled up against the lower portion of the frame, leaving behind a stain once reserved for horror films. No carrier ever forgot their first morning’s clean up, either.

Or the period between the onset of symptoms and the blood-proofing updates to their sleeping area. That is, if they could afford them. Otherwise, the stains simply piled up, stiffening carpets and absorbing into drywall until the nightly tracks of nano-migration were essentially permanent.

On this morning, Dylan rose as shaky, uncertain, and alone as always, closing the window and looking out at the snowy neighborhood. Gleaming white shone from the center of his neighbor’s yards, turning to pink and then crimson toward the bots’ migration paths. They essentially followed the same flow as rainwater might, even though studies showed the bots actually propelled and controlled the solution of tech and blood. Wintertime gave the effect of specialized blood gutters, carved out from the snow, showing the exact path taken from every carrier’s home as the bots found one another. The paths came together, joined as one, and moved on down the line; flowing first into the real gutters, then the storm drains, and onward.

After waiting an hour or so for the nanobots in his system to mostly replenish both themselves and his blood supply, Dylan pulled on his boots and coat to shovel the driveway. Snow crunched under his feet as he inhaled the first taste of sharp crisp air. A slight tang of iron floated onto his tongue. Bill McCreary must’ve just finished with his snowblower.

The McCreary house next door slept at least ten, by Dylan’s count, and from the looks of it they were all symptomatic carriers. When Bill came out to clear their driveway and sidewalks, his snowblower resembled a woodchipper being fed human bodies. The blood mist hung so heavily in the air that Dylan could taste it.

He wondered briefly if he’d ever be shoveling for two. Maybe that would justify the expense of a snowblower.

Scraping shovel against concrete and adding to his own pink pile in the yard cleared the remaining woozieness in Dylan’s head, and he felt almost back to normal. Exercise seemed to speed up the regeneration of both bots and blood for reasons no one could quite explain. 

With the driveway passable, Dylan climbed into his tiny sedan, switched on the radio, and backed out, heading to the office.

The monster featured prominently in several of the morning’s news stories. Water boiling advisories had gone out in several New Jersey counties after the failure of their water treatment center’s blood-borne pathogen control protocols. A local hospital opened that week featuring state-of-the-art hermetic sealing of every room, meaning that carriers and non-carriers were no longer held on separate wards.

Just as Dylan pulled into a parking space, they started describing some rare footage showing the blood monster piled up so high it appeared to be standing. Footage like this was indeed rare, but not unheard of, and Dylan figured it was probably like all the other clips he’d seen: a dark, gelatinous blob, three to five feet tall, oozing along a gutter. Creepy, sure, but although the blobs were slightly elongated, categorizing anything a blob did as “standing” felt like a bridge too far. The nanobots liked to stick together, probably they were just rolling a long distance between storm drains. Or otherwise the nearest drains were blocked up, it happened often enough. Some people just desperately wanted the phenomenon to have a purpose, or at least a meaning, even if it was nefarious. The person who captured the footage said the blob was looking at them, and Dylan switched off the radio. 

Sure, it was looking at you, and I had a conversation with my jello yesterday.

Still, the story stuck with him. Whether it was the eerie notion of the giant nanobot-filled bubble of blood slime, or the search for meaning in an inescapable fact of life, something glued Dylan’s eyes to the floor as he walked inside. So much that he nearly missed the look on Aaron’s face behind the reception desk, itching to tell him the news that they had just fired Kim from Human Resources.

After her partner died, Kim took advantage of the company’s bereavement leave policy, which at two weeks was comparatively generous. The higher-ups publicly encouraged her to take all the time she needed to grieve, but once she was out their grumblings about her absence weren’t exactly private. They also continued to needlessly CC her on emails in the hopes she would prove her loyalty by chiming in and working from home. When she came back, Kim asked for a raise to help cover the gap left in her personal finances. She was denied. Apparently she then lost her house and tried sleeping in her office, which was windowless and carpeted.

The blood-stained trail from Kim’s office to the nearest exit was larger than any Dylan had ever seen from a single carrier. She tried to contain it, covering the floor with plastic sheeting and shoving weather stripping beneath the door, but the bots eventually found a way through like they always did. Dylan stepped over the trail with a deep breath, trying to pretend that seeing this in a public indoor space was normal. Trying not to think about the havoc being wrought on Kim’s epigenome.

New generations of bots always made the most epigenetic alterations, and over half the nanobots in Kim’s body were being replaced on a nightly basis, judging by the size of the blood path.

Surely a cleaning team would be along to scrub it away any moment now. Or, more likely, an unfortunate intern would spend the next two days trying to get rid of the evidence without crying.

A full, warm glass carafe called to Dylan from the break room. He could see it, dark and shining under fluorescent lights. But he stayed clear, walking down the opposite side of the bullpen and hoping Cindy from Accounts Receivable didn’t see him. Sure, he may have beaten her into the office that morning, but there was no way to tell without getting too close to her cubicle. With her desk right across from the break room door, it was impossible to get in and back out again without catching Cindy’s eye. Even if she wasn’t there yet, she could easily slip behind her desk before Dylan finished pouring his cup. Then he would be stuck. He would have to face her some time today, but not now. Not this early. Not with this much blood monster imagery swimming in his mind.

A quiet buzz about the morning’s firing circled its way around the office, working from section to section around the room before starting back at the beginning. Whispers floated from desk to desk or blossomed from passing glances. Several people stopped by Dylan’s cubicle to discuss the news in hushed voices. Very little work got done, but that didn’t bother him. Very little work ever got done between Thanksgiving and New Year’s, no matter the circumstances. What bothered Dylan was the tone.

Kim was very unpopular in the way that competent HR representatives often are. They exist for the sole purpose of limiting any and all liabilities that come along with the necessity of employing human beings. They hire, they fire, they administer safety directives, they implement any protocols desired by their superiors, and they do so in a manner designed to be as legally airtight as possible. In other words, Human Resource departments exist to protect organizations from the humans they employ. In order to retain legal legitigmacy however, they must operate under the preposterous pretense that they exist to protect those same humans. In the face of this obvious and confusing conflict of interest, a competent Human Resources professional is very difficult to like.

Kim was extremely competent.

Dylan figured this accounted for the tone of quietly suppressed glee accompanying the whispers. The words themselves indicated deep shock and sympathy for the unfortunate circumstances. The delivery tasted of a delicious irony for the whisperers, who couldn’t think of anything better than a compliant member of the HR team sent packing. The woman just lost everything. Dylan wished his coworkers could show a little decency.

By ten-thirty, he simply couldn’t hold out any longer. Coffee must be had.

Stalking around the bullpen, taking the long way to avoid the intern quietly weeping over the damp trail of blood, Dylan swung into the break room without looking to Cindy’s desk. He grabbed the warm carafe, and braced himself for the onslaught. With a deep breath, he turned around, knowing she would be there.

But she wasn’t.

Not in the break room. Not at her desk. Not anywhere in sight.

Dylan leaned back against the counter with a sigh of relief. Maybe he had been worried for nothing. After all, she could hardly be at her desk all day every day. He blew the steam from his mug, and nearly dropped it when Cindy’s head popped around the doorframe.

“Hey, there you are!”

A pained expression did not cross Dylan's face. “Good morning, Cindy.” He said, not really sounding like it was good.

“Too bad about Kim,” Cindy said, not really sounding like it was bad.

The silence always killed him. Like watching a pressure vessel filled to bursting. Expanding to seemingly impossible size, then freezing. That in-between moment just before it explodes.

Cindy finally looked back at him. “So… you excited about tonight?”

“Sure,” Dylan said, not really sounding sure.

“Of course you are! Why wouldn't you be?” She had that crazed look in her eye. “Tiana’s great! Smart, good looking, lots of… special interests… Sure, she could use a bit of an attitude adjustment, always been a little holier-than-thou for my taste… But I just think you two would be great together!”

This was not Dylan's first time being set up by Cindy, and it always went like this. Cindy would badger him about his love life for a while, getting nothing but non-committal answers. Then, deciding that must mean he was both still single and very embarrassed about it, she began dropping obvious hints about someone she knew and how great they were. “Two master's degrees and that figure… Can you believe she's still single?” 

After a week or so of break room cornering, ill-concealed suggestions, and sidelong glances, Cindy switched to direct requests to set up a date. Dylan's consistently non-committal answers never bought him more than two weeks before she eventually found a way to interpret one as an enthusiastic yes. From there it mostly sounded just like this morning: a string of compliments about the new target, followed by all the reasons Cindy didn't actually seem to like them.

Dylan inevitably showed up to the rendezvous primed with very specific ways to dislike whoever he was supposed to meet. There had never been a second date.

He tried to resist at first, making up pre-existing plans, playing off seasonal allergies as cold or flu. Anything but the truth: he found this whole set-up gambit extremely annoying. At least, sometimes he did. Other times he wondered if it was really any worse than the dating apps.

They all felt the same to him. HeartFire. Get2Gether. Even CarrierConnection, which billed itself as a complete departure from the world of online dating. 

Every platform said this about themselves, to be sure, but Dylan really wanted to believe this one. It was, of course, for carriers only, and that seemed promising. On paper, at least. It saved would-be couples from awkward conversations about augmented epigenetics, parentage, and family history. It also acted as a buffer for fears around shame and embarrassment. 

Every carrier who had been with a non-carrier knew that feeling after their first night together. The look on their partner's face as they were confronted with the horror show that is a carrier’s daily reality. The look that said they wouldn't be your partner much longer.

This exclusivity workaround sounded promising to Dylan. In practice however, it turned out to be mostly filled with carriers looking for one night stands, absent the bloodier parts of shame. That and horror fetishists posing as carriers for their own reasons.

He never found anyone he could get close with.

And besides, he told himself, Cindy was just a nice person trying to do a nice thing. Or at least she thought she was. And what was wrong with that? 

Aside from the fact that everyone believes themselves to be a good person trying to do good things. Even villains don't think of themselves as villains. Every atrocity in human history was perpetrated in the name of the greater good. 

But come on, Cindy wasn't exactly manufacturing genocide. She just pushed people together somewhat against their will. Still, Dylan thought describing her as a “nice person” may be going a little too far.

In the moments needed to fill time around her sales pitch, Cindy eventually divulged a good deal of her theories about the world. For example, homelessness could be solved easily by just arresting them all, but that she would absolutely refuse to pay any increase in taxes associated with it. “They can just fend for themselves. I mean, it’s what they were doing before, right?”

While she didn’t actually believe the Earth was flat, she wasn’t convinced it was round either.

She also believed the nanobots were the mark of the Anti-Christ. “It just makes sense, ya know? I mean, in Revelations it says clear as day that the Anti-Christ will mark those under his influence. What more obvious sign could there be? All these great big trails of blood leading right back to people’s beds. I say a little prayer of thanks every time I drive past a clean house, praising Him for the saved.”

Dylan didn’t have the heart or the patience to point out that before the bots, fundamentalists often said that barcodes were the mark of the beast that would one day adorn the followers of the Anti-Christ. Or that a far more obvious mark would be the overwhelming number of needlessly hateful political signs and flags outside people’s homes. But the people putting up those signs and flags were generally the ones looking for the Anti-Christ, and they were unlikely to look in their own front yard.

It didn’t matter. Not really.

Cindy didn’t even know Dylan was a carrier, let alone that how he felt about her world view. His instinct to provide barely passable answers allowed others to simply project themselves onto him. He was a life-size, semi-transparent mirror for anyone who didn’t care too much about the other side of a conversation. They smiled at their own reflections, superimposed over his face as they turned his vague mutterings into enthusiastic agreement. Such people often told Dylan he was a great listener.

This instinct to hide himself resulted in a total lack of satisfactory conversation in Dylan’s life. It had been years since he really confided his own opinions on existence to anyone. 

In that moment, for example, Cindy’s monologue on Tiana’s strengths and weaknesses indicated that, while Cindy thought it impolite to ask, such a nice girl couldn’t possibly carry the blood monster. Dylan was fairly certain that, by this point, nearly every person on the planet was actually a carrier, with a huge percentage being merely asymptomatic. Research continually showed that, when tested, most people carried some level of the nanobots. But asymptomatic people had no reason to be tested, so why bother? Their lives were normal, if such a thing had ever existed. On the occasion that some non-human part of the environment was tested for nanobots, the researchers almost always found nanobots. They were small enough to alter the function of DNA itself. How could anyone just assume they hadn’t been exposed?

This was precisely the sort of thing Dylan never said to Cindy, or anyone else.

“What are you going to wear?”

“Hmm?” Dylan sort of said.

“Tonight, silly. What are you going to wear? That way I can tell Tiana and she’ll recognize you when you get there.”

__________________________

Dylan wore a blue collared shirt and tan blazer as he walked up to the modest restaurant that night, just as he’d told Cindy he would. Though his parka, hat, and scarf covered almost everything but his eyes. 

The repetitive crunch-squeak of snow beneath his feet managed to be somehow both meditative and distracting, both calming him and telling him he really shouldn’t be here. But the hesitation didn’t begin until Dylan reached the corner of 4th and Charles. The rhythm of his footsteps barely slowed at first, from the brisk damn-its-cold 120 beats per minute, down to about 112. Hardly noticeable. A skip over a harshly frozen blood trail, then it dropped to 94. A car door slammed behind him, and Dylan looked over his shoulder to see a similarly bundled woman struggling to lock the vehicle while carrying two very full paper grocery bags. He turned back around, and continued on at 67 beats per minute.

A slow shuffle. Less than a casual stroll.

Another cautious hop over another blood-slick, frozen nanobot path, and Dylan’s rhythm came to a halt in front of the restaurant window.

The blue houndstooth dress made Tiana very easy for him to spot. Not because it was particularly bright or unique, but because it’s familiarity hit Dylan like a blood-laden snowball. That dress… That face… Could it be? He questioned his own sanity for a moment. His very place in the universe seemed suddenly uncertain. 

It wasn’t her. It couldn’t be. It had to be Tiana. His eyes must have been playing tricks on him.

Dylan shut those eyes very tightly and took a deep, stabilizing breath.

When he opened them the dress was still there, but the face above it settled into something less familiar that must’ve been exactly what Tiana looked like. Intellectually, Dylan knew it to be Tiana. Cindy told him she would be a blonde woman wearing a blue dress, and though he hadn’t been listening very closely, no one else in the place fit that description. 

Still though, the appearance of that blue houndstooth dress had momentarily sent him back in time. 

He saw it, many years ago. That same dress, on a different woman. On a very different night. At the same table in the same restaurant. 

By the autumn night when he last saw the dress, Dylan and the woman he thought he was going to marry had been together for nearly three years. No particularly special reason drove him to bring her here, apart from perhaps the blind panic that afflicted him when approaching a big moment in life. They both liked the food and the atmosphere. It was nice enough they didn’t go there regularly, but not so nice she might be tipped off. 

The woman he thought he was going to marry saw right through him anyway. Dylan’s nerves had a habit of giving him away, and she was always very perceptive. Or perhaps suspicious. Or both. Or neither. His feelings had become conflicted on that point over the years. But she loved him, and he loved her.

She told him in their earliest days together she had never experienced the blood bond carriers always talk about. Not with anyone. Dylan couldn’t believe it, and he’d said as much.

No one? Lacking the bond with romantic partners was understandable, but no one? Friends? Siblings? Not even her parents? But no.

That, Dylan thought, was just about the saddest thing he had ever heard. It meant she had never been truly close with anyone. Or at least with another carrier. The bond could happen with any other carrier, as long as they were open with one another.

And it happened with them, too, after a few months. Dylan had experienced it only a handful of times before, but he knew how to tell when it was coming. A surging in the veins after a long, heartfelt conversation. Like the bots were gathering together and voting on whether or not to go through with it. Then, while he and the woman he thought he would marry held hands, small droplets of blood seeped through the skin in the crooks of their elbows. 

Instead of the steady flow that occurred as they slept, these isolated droplets rolled slowly down their forearms. Instead of simply joining together and running off to find the nearest gutter, they passed like ships in the night over the pair’s joined hands. Then his droplet climbed up her forearm, as hers climbed up his, and the droplets faded into skin, reincorporating themselves into their new hosts.

From the outside, that was end of the process. Inside however, research showed that when two carriers exchanged nanobots, the bots themselves began to work collaboratively. Only a few dozen typically made the traverse from host to host, but once inside, the new and the old started scanning each other and making structural changes to themselves. 

Studies then clearly demonstrated a significant change in the pattern of alterations the nanobots made to the host’s epigenetics. The scale and expression of these changes was ill-defined. People reported euphoria, depression, anxiety, calm, and neutrality all in nearly equal measure after experiencing the blood blond.

Dylan’s father told him it simply depended on the people bonding, which made sense.

He’d felt so sorry for the woman he thought he was going to marry and her lack of that closeness in all her life. He’d felt so honored to be the first person she shared that bond with.

Later, in the years after they’d parted, Dylan wondered if it took so long because she was never really open with anyone. That felt even sadder.

But on that autumn night, seeing her in that blue houndstooth dress, he felt only love. Love, and anticipation. 

Dylan was too afraid of strangers and crowds to propose right there in the restaurant, so he did it across the street. She said yes.

For a while.

Dylan turned his back to the window and faced the very spot where it happened. A foot of snow lay there now. Breath pushed through his scarf, turning into fog and partially obscuring the view.

He should never have agreed to meet Tiana here. Why would he do that to himself? Forgetfulness? Sabotage? An unbelievable degree of optimism that he was finally over it?

No, all this is ridiculous!

He took two steps toward the door inside. What am I doing here? He turned around. Are you really going to let this govern the rest of your life? He made for the door again.

Before he knew it, Dylan was pacing two steps back and forth in front of the restaurant window, practically twirling in circles, and talking to himself like a madman. He stopped, and faced the window to find Tiana staring at him with a confused expression. She wasn’t the only one.

Oh God.

Had she recognized him? How could she?

I have to get out of here!

Putting his head down to break eye contact, Dylan spun on his heel and took two quick strides before slamming into a large, brown, crinkly object. He had collided with the bundled woman and her grocery bags, and they both began to slip and slide atop the frozen blood trail he’d skipped over earlier. Their feet moved faster and faster as they each tried to maintain balance.

“I’m s-so sorry!” Dylan stammered, as they skated uncontrollably toward the curb. He reached out to steady the stranger, and tore one side of a grocery bag from top to bottom as they both lost their footing and went down.

Produce rained to the ground around them.

Dylan squirmed on his back, all the air having rushed from his lungs as though it was scared off by the fall. “You okay?” He asked, trying to push himself up.

“Peachy,” the stranger said. A nectarine rolled past her face. “Did you hit your head or anything?”

“Um…” Dylan tried getting to his feet, scrambled again, and flopped down on his side, sliding toward the stranger. “No, I don't think so.” 

They both broke into uncomfortable laughter.

“This red ice is the bane of my existence,” she groaned. “We'll have to outsmart it. Why don't you scoot your way out to solid ground, then come around and help me up?”

Dylan did so, pulling his scarf down to try and catch his breath. Back on her feet, the stranger started brushing snow off herself. Something about her intrigued Dylan. He caught himself staring, and immediately bent down to collect some of the scattered groceries.

“Oh, you don't have to do that. There was a fifty-fifty chance I'd have dropped a bag on my way home anyway.”

“Please,” Dylan said, “this is entirely my fault. It's the least I can do.”

Together they gathered up bruised produce and dented canned goods, but only so much would fit in the one remaining bag. Dylan stood there awkwardly with his arms just barely containing the rest.

“Ah!” said the stranger, holding up a finger and taking off her scarf. “It doubles as a shawl.” She laid the large piece of fabric on the snowy sidewalk and layered the ripped paper bag on top. Gesturing for Dylan to place his groceries on top, she tied the whole thing up into a loose bundle and struggled to her feet, makeshift bundle and intact bag teetering precariously in her arms.

The nectarine slipped out of the bundle and thudded onto the concrete again. Dylan picked it up. “How far are you going? Could I help you carry everything?”

The stranger gave him a momentarily appraising look, then said, “Well, this is entirely your fault. I suppose it's the least you can do.” A smile crossed her face as she let Dylan take the lumpy shawl from her arms.

Light shone from an entryway nearby. They headed toward it, passing a snowy alley who’s blood trail terminated in a storm drain. The stranger fished for her keys.

“Listen,” she said as they stood outside the door. “I have a very strict rule about not letting strangers into my apartment…”

“Right…” Dylan mumbled, and he made to transfer the bundle to her. “That makes sense.”

“My name's Verne.” He looked up at her. “...this is the part where you say you're…?”

“Dylan. I'm Dylan.”

“Great,” Verne said. “Now we aren't strangers. Come on Dylan.” She pushed open the door and led him up a narrow staircase.

“Cool name,” he said as she unlocked a door at the top landing. She eyed him curiously. “Verne, I mean. I like it”

“Short for Laverne. My parents were a little obsessed with 70s TV, but I always liked the sound of Verne better. Then people started buying me Jules Verne books, and I got a little obsessed with 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea… as you'll notice.”

He did. 

As they entered, Dylan saw dark blue paint lining the walls and nautical knick-knacks on display throughout the living room. Antique diving gear hung by the window. An old ship's compass sat shining on an end table. So many books crowded the corner bookshelf it looked like they would start sliding off at any moment. Except, of course, for a well-maintained layer in the middle, dedicated to special editions of Jules Verne’s collected works. 

He also noticed her choice of materials. Hemophobic paint and flooring seemed to cover everything.

“I love it,” Dylan said.

“Thanks. I tend to fall asleep on the couch watching movies, so I blood-proofed the whole place.” They set their parcels on the kitchen counter, and Verne let out a sigh. “Well…”

“Right. Yeah,” he said. “I should probably go. Unless… Well, neverm-... Unless you'd… Um…”

“Come on man, you can get there.”

“Unless you'd like to go get a drink or a bite to eat?”

She smiled at him.

“So, where should we go?” Verne asked as they tromped back down the stairs. “There's a decent place right where we smacked into each other.”

“Uhhh… yeah.” Dylan faltered for a moment. “We should probably go somewhere else.” And, before he could stop himself, he told her everything. About Tiana, about Cindy, about the woman he thought he was going to marry. He even told her about the dress. To his surprise, she did not immediately tell him to get lost.

“I mean, it's not great,” she said, “but I think I get it.”

“Seriously, I'm not the kind of person who just stands people up. I shouldn't have agreed to meet there, I guess I just thought I was over it. When it turned out I wasn't, I panicked and ran for it…”

Verne looked at him like he had said something very stupid. “Dylan, come on, nobody's that over it.”

She asked if he'd ever been to the Orbit Cafe. “They only serve hot dogs and canned beer, but it's very good beer.”

The Orbit Cafe consisted of a single long room in the basement of a pre-war apartment building. Upon walking down the stairs and hanging up his coat, Dylan realized he had in fact been here once before, years ago, grieving something and getting very drunk. There had been a piano player. He had tipped irresponsibly well. For some reason, he told Verne all of this.

“That makes sense,” she said.

They sat at a quiet corner table eating, drinking, and talking. It went on for hours. Dylan talked about Cindy’s worldly theories. Verne seemed most interested in the one about the not-so-round Earth, as it probably involved the race of lizard people living in their underground cities.

Verne told him about her parents’ divorce. How much they turned on each other. How she started falling asleep on the couch watching late night movies because she wasn’t able to sleep alone. That’s when she first became symptomatic. She told him about how loudly she was screamed at for ruining the white carpet, and how bad the bleach fumes had stung her nostrils as she scrubbed away at the stains. It hadn’t been the last time.

That got them talking about the blood monster.

The story of Dylan’s first morning. The footage of the monster seemingly standing up in the gutters. People’s need to find meaning in the whole thing. All the wild theories about the nanobots’ origins.

Unsurprisingly, Verne’s favorite was about lizard people. That one says the bots are a biotech weapon unleashed by the powers-that-be in the underground cities. Apparently, once they infected a large enough portion of the population the nanobots would “activate” and take control of the human race. “If you dig deep enough in any conspiracy theory rabbit hole, eventually you’ll find someone talking about lizard people,” she laughed.

They both agreed, however, that the most likely explanation had to do with the accidental and unholy marriage of research in micro-robotics and synthetic biology. A significant amount of historical evidence backed up this more traditional analysis, as well as humankind’s well-documented habit of blindly releasing their creations into the environment without any understanding of the consequences. But it just wasn’t as fun as anti-christs, aliens, or lizard people.

“Exactly,” Dylan said. “Besides, if the lizard people wanted to control us, I figure they have everyone they need by now. I think that, at this point, almost everyone on the planet is probably a carrier. Just a lot of them are asymptomatic. 

“Think about it: practically every time a non-carrier gets tested, some trace amount of bots is found in their blood. They haven’t been around long enough for us to actually evolve with them, but the bots modify both themselves and our epigenetics. So, what if asymptomatic carriers are just the first wave of truly successful integration with the nanotech? The first generation of functional companionship between us and the bots?”

“Maybe,” said Verne, “but I like to think that every carrier is a work-in-progress. That the nanobots are constantly changing us and themselves in an effort to help us cope with the world as it is. Every night they purge what hasn’t worked, and try again. It’s a neverending battle in a world that changes constantly, but I like the idea that they’re helping us to become the best version of ourselves for the circumstances that surround us. And when we get close to other people, the bots can sense it. They want to help this other person too… this other community of flesh and tech… and so they reach out.” She stared straight into Dylan’s eyes.

That’s when he felt it.

Without speaking, Verne and Dylan each rolled up one sleeve. They felt the surging in their veins, and reached across the table to join hands. They watched as a single drop of blood seeped out of each of them, rolling down forearms and over fingers, passing one another. They looked into each other’s eyes as the droplets sank back into skin.

The change began immediately.

They hoped it would be for the better.