Glitch

laughed again. It was a warm hearty sound that made
    my chest curl in happiness. “Sorry, you’d think I’d be better
    at explaining all of this by now. Usually I have more time to
    prepare a glitcher for the outside world. And being around
    you, I just get . . .”
    His face colored as he looked away. “Anyway, a conscience
    isn’t like a physical part of you. It’s just there, or it should be
    there, in everyone. It’s part of what makes us human. Some-
    times you can feel it. Right here.” He reached out, hesitating
    just above my heart monitor, pausing. Then he looked into
    my eyes and dropped his hand.
    I frowned. “But what about my Gift? Where does that
    come from?”
    Adrien scooted back in his chair. “The easy answer is evo-
    lution. That’s how I always start off explaining it anyway.
    They started shunting around with our brains and inserting
    all that cracking hardware. They thought they could get to-
    tal control over people. But they forgot one of the basics of
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    life on Earth—” His eyes sparkled as he leaned in, grinning
    conspiratorially. “—organisms adapt!”
    “Old World scientists called it ‘plasticity.’ Basically, the
    brain can rewire itself even if crucial parts are damaged.
    Evolution might be the wrong word— it’s not like glitchers
    are a new species. Just highly adapted. We’ve started devel-
    oping abilities that get around their programming, making
    neural connections to subvert the hardware. Even with all
    our tech, the brain is something.”
    We’ve never completely understood. His hand move-
    ments grew wilder as he got excited. “Maybe it’s something
    that can’t be completely understood. There’s still so much
    mystery. Not to mention the parts about being human that
    are simply—” He lifted his hands. “—intangible. Like our
    souls or spirits, or what ever it is that makes us us. ”
    “Souls?” I arched my eyebrows, barely stopping myself
    from scoffi
    ng. “Like in the barbarian Old World religions?”
    He smiled and shrugged, some of his energy seeming to
    wind back down. “I don’t know. But you’ve felt it, haven’t
    you? Those feelings that seem to get so big in your chest,
    like something is so beautiful it aches?”
    My mouth dropped open in surprise. He was right. I had
    felt exactly that. When I’d seen color for the fi rst time, or
    when I watched my brother sleeping.
    “What is that?” he continued. His face had a quieter in-
    tensity as he leaned over. His green eyes caught every bit
    of light in the room and seemed to refract it in a thousand
    sparkles. “Beauty, happiness, they’re things so big they can’t
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    capture them with their scientifi c words. It’s like what they
    used to call magic.”
    I sat for a moment focusing on what he’d said, never look-
    ing away from his eyes. I wasn’t able to follow everything—
    but watching him get so excited, it was unlike anything I
    had ever seen before. I’d never seen so much emotion on a
    person’s face. It lit me up inside, made my chest feel bright
    and warm. It was like there was a connection between us,
    like somehow he knew me. Like he could reach right into me,
    pluck out the things I felt and thought, and put them into
    words in ways I hadn’t learned to express yet.
    But I couldn’t agree with him completely. I looked at him
    regretfully.
    “But even emotions can be broken down to electrical
    synapses and chemical reaction. Isn’t that what the V-chip
    proved? Emotion is all physical response. No invisible soul
    to it.”
    “Yeah. but even under their complete control of synapses
    and chemicals, your mind managed to break free.” Adrien
    looked at me warmly. “That you exist this way, Zoe, you’re
    the ultimate proof that we can be so much more than just the
    sum of our parts and knee- jerk impulses. Something about
    you just could not be controlled, just had to be free.”
    I couldn’t help smiling again at his enthusiasm. “I don’t
    think I can quite agree with your theory, but I like the way
    you talk about it. It makes life seem— I don’t know— more
    special? More important?
    He grinned eyes catching mine again until I felt like there
    was some kind of electric current passing between us.
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    “Sorry if I’ve been rambling. I just never get to talk to
    anyone about all this. Mom never wants to hear it— she says
    it doesn’t matter why things are happening, just that