Proxy

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Even a perfect machine wasn’t built to go this fast.

    Knox knew it, but still he pressed harder on the accelerator. Ripples of heat blurred the air around the car, and the girl in the passenger seat squealed.

    Terror? Delight? Did it matter?

    He took a turn too sharply, felt the stabilizer engine straining. His windshield lit up with warnings: lane markers flashing red, speed indicators blinking. Sweat beaded on his upper lip, but the car held the road.

    R U glitched? popped up in his datastream in translucent green letters. He could see through them to the pavement, but they were impossible to ignore.

    He glanced at the girl, giggling to cover her nerves.

    They curved up the speedway, slicing like heat lightning over the slums of the Lower City, past the blast barriers and security fences, rising higher and higher. There were parts of the Mountain City you just didn’t go to if you were lux, parts you didn’t even see. The city below them blurred. The city beside them gleamed. Knox accelerated.

    srsly?! blinked double sized in front of Knox, each letter wiggling and changing colors. The font was chunky; the y swished like a cat’s tail. Very retro. Probably custom-made for her by some trendy for-hire coder. Her hands waved in the air in front of the windshield, swiping out another text. :) she added.

    Suddenly, her smiley face vanished.

    Reduce Speed . . . Reduce Speed . . . Reduce Speed . . . scrolled in front of Knox in an unfriendly industrial font. All the road signs and advertisements now said the same thing: Danger Danger Danger.

    Knox waved off the augmented-reality hookup. You weren’t supposed to be able to turn it off, but Knox had yet to find a security system he couldn’t hack. AR driving was for amateurs and accountants anyway. He gunned the car forward. The speed pressed him against the auto-cooled leather seats.

    “You even know how to drive?” the girl cried out loud, her voice shrill and excited.

    Knox didn’t say a word. He liked to let the growl of the engine do the talking.

    He also couldn’t remember the girl’s name.

    Amy? Pam?

    Something old-fashioned. He shot her another glance, his emerald eyes flashing mischief. He smirked.

    That usually did the trick.

    She was new in Mr. Kumar’s History of Robotics class, a transfer from homeschooling. She liked the animations Knox hacked onto the public display on top of their teacher’s scowling face. Sometimes Knox gave Mr. Kumar devil horns or a top hat or made it look like he was lecturing them from a seedy strip club in the Lower City. The girl had complimented Knox’s work on her first day at school.

    Mr. Kumar never had any idea his image had been hacked. He just talked away from his wood-paneled office at EduCorp. He couldn’t figure out why the kids always laughed so hard at his lectures. Not that he could do anything about it. They were all paying customers and could laugh all they wanted. That was a perk of going to a top-tier patron school. The customer was always right.

    Knox had a knack for hacking datastreams, but school wasn’t really his thing. He could do the work when he wanted, when he had the right motivation, but grades weren’t it. A girl—any girl really—now that was good motivation.