Page 146 of Tapeworld Induction

He shook his head, not seeing the relevance of trees to racism.

“Didn’t think you would.” Astrid frowned. “That’s the problem with you kids. Taking this world for granted, spattering it with your ideologies.” She pumped the air in a mocking masturbation gesture. He looked away in disgust. “People began to look out for strains of trees that looked peculiar, different. Specific species. In order to treat the disease, those had to be uprooted, or the entire ecosystem would collapse.”

She moved closer to him, grinning, her teeth like fangs. “And right now I’m looking at a disease that needs uprooting.”

Isaak backed away, only to hit a wall that materialised behind him.

“Are you a fungus, Isaak?” Astrid asked, her arms around his neck, threatening an unwanted kiss, hands playing with the hair on the back of his head, the way Dylan did.

“Stay away from me, and keep your bullshit metaphors to yourself. Stop trying to justify the shit you’re doing.” He tried to make himself smaller, to slip away. His hand instinctively went to grab the tape from his head, yank it off and escape her. But he knew it wasn’t safe with Astrid so close.

She snatched his arm, her nails biting into his flesh, drawing blood.

“Nuh-uh…” she said, her face right next to his ear. “Not YET!”

The scream nearly tore his eardrum, augmenting the pain in his knee as it reverberated throughout his body. He crumpled.

Astrid walked away, letting him fall to the floor. She snapped her fingers.

“What are you doing?” His ears were ringing.

Shining in the moonlight, tendrilous structures extruded upwards from the ground, black and clear plastic tape. The feelers shot towards him, leaving him no time to react, ensnaring his arms and legs in taut hard plastic. They shifted, forcing his legs into a sitting position, arms at his side. There was no way to escape.

“You fucking—” he snarled, spitting through gritted teeth.

“No fucking yet, Ike. I’m just giving you a front row seat to what comes next, babe.” Her voice was a hushed whisper, the kind you’d use with a lover in the dark.

She repulsed him.

Astrid stepped back into the darkness, snapped her fingers once more, and disappeared.

Another woman took Astrid’s place. Smiling at him. The decades had lined her features since he’d last seen her, but he could never have mistaken her for anyone else.

“Mum?”

Unable to wipe them away, tears streamed down his face. He swallowed deep, trying to stifle the weeping. For reasons he could not understand, his mum was wearing an Elizabethan dress, cinched at the waist and heavily ruffled, complete with lacy trim, in various shades of black. He had never seen her like this. It was a gaudy display, a show of power. But from his mum, or from Astrid, he wasn’t able to tell.

“After Astrid invited me to join her at the company, I was drawn in deeper and deeper.” She said Astrid’s name with a warmth he recognised, one usually reserved for talking about family. “It was a welcome distraction. Life at home was…”

“Miserable…” Isaak completed.

“Wasn’t it just?”

His mum sat down, a chair forming out of luminescence behind her. A black leather chair with a tall, wing-shaped back-rest and supple armrests. It matched the dress she wore, the same aesthetics of extravagance and leisure. A corrupting influence from Astrid, he thought.

“At first, Crypterra was all parties, social engagements, public speaking. There was one phrase Astrid used all the time, ‘Thinking strategy! You’re not thinking strategy, Maria!’” She said it in falsetto, imitating Astrid’s voice.

Then his mum’s face fell. She wrapped her arms around herself, the Elizabethan dress shapeshifting into a black business suit, the ruffles and frills dissolving into nothing.

She shifted her seating position on the chair. It was as if she was trying to make herself at home, to be comfortable in luxury, but an undercurrent of worry and anxiety kept her from being able to do so.

“Then you stopped sleeping at home as often,” he said. “I remember you’d say it was work travel.”

Frowning, anguish struck his mum’s face. What he said had wounded her.

“It was!” she said defensively. “At first…” She looked away from him. “Your dad had given up on our ideals. I didn’t recognise him when I came home. He started eating meat!” she spat. “And Astrid, she was always there for me, just a text away. She recognised me. Talked to me as a person. Not as a mother or caretaker.”

Isaak’s stomach twisted, guessing what would come next.