by Eliza Green
Thomas stood by Jacob’s shoulder. ‘Anything I can do...?’
Jacob didn’t answer either of them. He squinted at the data on the machine’s screen, one fist on his hip, the other on the table.
‘Her NMC is fried and it’s interfering with her circuitry.’ He backed away from the table. ‘I don’t know how to reactivate her.’
One of the lab people stepped forward. ‘We can replace it.’
Jacob looked up sharply. ‘With what?’
‘A new NMC.’
Jacob blinked. ‘How? You don’t even know what you’re dealing with.’
Agatha said, ‘We do. The NMCs came from here. As did Quintus.’
Vanessa pressed a hand to her mouth.
Charlie gasped. ‘How is that possible?’
Dom looked at the pair. ‘I’ll explain later. Right now we have a serious problem and Carissa might be the only one who can help.’
But as the team worked on Carissa, he couldn’t be sure she’d ever wake up.
29
Carissa
Warmth spread through her head. Her ocular implants began to water. A deep surge of pain hit her NMC and she screamed, but no sound came. Carissa had never experienced death before, but at least it contained familiar sounds and feelings.
She thought she heard the Inventor say, ‘We need you, miss,’ but it must have been a residual memory.
It surprised her that death hurt so much.
She fluttered her eyes open, seeing a brightness that instantly reduced them to two slits. This must be Copy heaven; it reminded her of Praesidium. A low hum of voices reached her ears. Just mumbles with no clarity.
Carissa blinked away the confusion. A group of people dressed in white stood in a huddle next to her. Copies. They had to be. But a familiar, old man was with them with his back to her.
A residual memory. That’s all it was
‘Inv—’ She cleared her throat and tried again. ‘Inventor.’
The vision of her friend turned and pushed the people in white away. He was grinning. The pleasant memory warmed her biogel. Although, she didn’t remember him smiling that widely before.
‘I thought I told you to call me Jacob.’
His voice came through clearer now. All their voices did.
Her part-organic heart thrummed in her chest as she realised. ‘I... I’m alive?’
The Inventor nodded.
She licked her lips. Last thing she remembered was passing out at the door. ‘Did... we make it?’
He nodded. Her eyes found the others. She saw them clearer now. Men and women dressed in white lab coats stared at her, their expressions serious. None of them were any Copies she’d seen before.
She blinked at the Inventor. ‘What’s going on?’
The old man’s smile dropped away; he drew his brows forward. ‘Quintus is here and he’s in the control systems.’
She sat up so fast her head spun.
The Inventor grabbed her. ‘Easy, miss.’
She swung her legs over the edge of the bed. ‘I have to stop him.’
His smile was back. ‘That’s what I was hoping you’d say.’
Carissa touched the connection point to her NMC. A familiar buzz sounded in her head that made her heart beat faster. ‘Is my NMC fixed?’
‘Yes. Agatha’s team were able to fix it.’
‘Agatha?’
Dom stepped forward. ‘There’s no time to lose, Jacob. We need to get to work.’
She hadn’t even seen him in the room. Anya was with him. A dark-skinned person stood next to the pair, wearing an electric-blue pant suit.
She stepped forward and thrust out her hand. ‘I’m Agatha. Nice to meet you.’
Carissa shook her hand tentatively, uncomfortable about the attention her death—and resurrection—had caused. But all she could think was that Quintus was here.
He’d followed her somehow.
It was time to silence him once and for all.
She jumped off the bed. ‘Tell me what I need to do.’
Agatha clasped her hands together. ‘Jacob tells me you spoke to him through your NMC, more than the other Copies did.’
She nodded. For some reason, Quintus was fixated with her. ‘He found a way to communicate with me separately.’
‘Well, he’s here inside my compound, and we need to stop him.’
Carissa didn’t know how exactly. She looked up at Jacob. ‘Should I try talking to him using my NMC?’
‘That would be a good start, miss.’
She closed her eyes, but opened them just as fast. ‘What should I say?’
‘Ask him where he is,’ said Agatha.
She closed her eyes again and reopened them. ‘Then what?’
‘Concentrate, miss. You know how to speak to him.’
Carissa closed her eyes once more. The second she tried her NMC, she sensed him. The connection sent a shiver through her.
‘173-C,’ Quintus said. ‘Where have you been? I’ve been looking for you.’
‘I’ve been... busy.’
‘Trying to escape?’
‘Yes, trying to help my friends to escape.’
‘I can feel you. You made it to the Beyond.’
Carissa opened her eyes and held her breath. Agatha had a walkie talkie in her hand.
She whispered to Carissa, ‘Distract him.’
She kept her eyes open and focused on the Inventor. He had his arms folded and a worried look on his face. It didn’t matter what Agatha had planned for her later; only her success mattered now.
‘Where are you, Quintus?’
The ethereal voice said, ‘I’m everywhere.’
‘Where are the other Collective?’
Quintus laughed lightly. ‘There was only ever me.’
She looked at Agatha, who rolled her hand to keep going. She flashed her eyes to the Inventor. His lips were pursed.
‘Only you? I don’t understand.’
‘I controlled it all, 173-C. The Ten were not separate voices, but personalities I created to help me control Praesidium and the Region. The Collective ten was my protection. If the Copies knew there was only me, it would have diluted the power I had over them.’
Agatha mumbled something into her walkie talkie. She scribbled something down in her notebook and waved her hand at Carissa, to get her attention.
She held up the notebook. It read: He’s in all the primary systems. We need him in a secondary one. We can create a firewall around him there.
Carissa nodded.
Quintus spoke. ‘Are they using you to distract me?’
She answered honestly. ‘Yes.’
‘I have control of their base now. I used to live here. They tried to take it from me once, but not again.’
‘What do you plan to do with it?’
‘Make it my new Praesidium.’
She didn’t see how that was possible. ‘It won’t be like the city, Quintus. There are no Copies here.’
The Inventor scribbled a message on a notepad and held it up. It read: What is he planning?
Quintus answered her. ‘I don’t need Copies, 173-C. I can control the humans through the environmental controls.’
‘They can leave.’
‘I control the doors, too.’
She grabbed the notepad and scribbled: new city.
The Inventor’s eyes widened when he read it. He showed it to Agatha, who spoke immediately to the people on the other end of her walkie talkie.
‘Why are you doing this, Quintus?’
She heard a laugh. ‘You used to follow my direction once. It’s actually a good thing that you’ve made it to the Beyond. I can also sense 118-C. Follow me again, 173-C. The three of us can make this compound ours.’
Agatha grabbed the notepad and scribbled something down.
Carissa said, ‘I want to stay with my friends.’
‘Your friends can stay here,’ Quintus replied.
‘That’s not what I meant...’
Agatha shoved the notepad under her nose with a note that read: Get him to environmental controls.
She mouthed, How?
Agatha pretended to choke then jabbed her finger at Carissa.
‘173-C, are you there? What are the humans asking you to do?’
‘Quintus... what are you doing to the air? I-I can’t breathe.’
She faked a panic attack, similar to the ones she had when something upset her.
The Inventor watched her closely. Others did, too, but she saw only two people.
A frowning Agatha rolled her hand at her.
Carissa’s voice grew louder. ‘Quintus, please... I can’t... breathe.’
‘I am not doing anything to the environmental controls. Breathe, 173-C. You are simply having one of your panic attacks.’
Quintus would have seen her panicked moments in the Inventor’s workshop through her downloaded memories. She glanced at the Inventor. He lifted both hands, as if to tell her to do more.
‘Quintus! There’s something... wrong.’ Her voice rose in pitch. ‘The humans, they’ve collapsed around me. My... lungs...’
She sucked in a new breath, but rattled it out.
A silence followed, as though Quintus had gone to check something.
Carissa dropped to the floor for dramatic effect. The Inventor lunged for her.
She waved him away. ‘Quintus! Hurry! The air...’
Agatha whispered into her walkie talkie.
Quintus came back online. ‘The environmental controls are operating as normal. Oxygen levels are normal. What’s happening there, 173-C?’
Carissa waved her hand at Agatha.
‘Go,’ she hissed into the walkie talkie.
A moment passed, then Quintus said, ‘What are you doing, 173-C? Why can’t I get out?’
The Inventor helped her to her feet.
Carissa brushed non-existent dirt from her clothes and spoke to the entity who had acted like her father in her early months. ‘It’s for your own good.’
‘No, 173-C. What are you doing? Tell them to let me out.’ He shouted in her head. ‘Let me out!’
A warm buzz started in her mind. It made her feel lightheaded.
‘Tell them to stop what they’re doing,’ said Quintus. He sounded panicked. ‘Or I’ll kill you.’
The dizziness in her head became worse and she dropped to her knees. ‘I can’t.’
The Inventor went to help her, but Agatha stopped him. Carissa looked up at the pair through her tears.
‘The antiviral attack needs time to work on all entities connected to Quintus,’ Agatha said to the Inventor. ‘That means her.’
Carissa’s eyes grew heavy. ‘Jacob...’
He knelt down and held her hand. ‘It’s okay, miss. I’m here.’
‘Am I dying?’
‘I don’t know, miss.’ He released a hard breath. ‘Is Quintus gone?’
She reached out for their connection. ‘I can’t hear him anymore.’
Agatha spoke into the walkie talkie before turning back to them. ‘The antiviral attack has completed on his original, hard-coded files, but we need to do the same on any start-up routine to prevent his program from enabling again.’
‘How long will that take?’
‘As long as necessary.’
The dizziness in her head swelled and she slumped against the Inventor’s chest. His arms pressed against her back.
‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered.
His voice rumbled in her ear. ‘For what?’
‘For trusting Quintus. For not helping you to escape the city sooner.’
He pushed her away and smiled through tears of his own. ‘It’s not your fault.’ He looked up and growled, ‘Do something. Help her.’
Agatha bent down. ‘We can reverse the effects of the memory purge but she won’t be the same.’
Carissa’s heart slowed to a beat every few seconds. ‘Jacob?’
‘Yes, miss?’
‘I love you.’
He smiled down at her. ‘I love you, too.’
Unfamiliar warmth flooded through her. Death wasn’t all that bad. She closed her eyes and allowed the hand of death to carry her to the next plane.
30
Anya
The tension in the compound deflated like a balloon. For the first time since they arrived, Anya didn’t feel like a prisoner. Agatha had come to get them an hour ago. She’d taken Anya and Dom on a tour of the compound, which wasn’t as big as she’d first thought. While they walked, they passed by more rooms that were being used for testing. She’d come to think of this base as a testing facility.
‘What are you going to do with Frahlia?’
‘My medical team has deemed her to be no threat. She was never connected. Neither was Jerome. I see no reason to keep either of them here for the long term.’
That surprised Anya. ‘I thought you’d jump at the chance to study them.’
Agatha just smiled, as if there was more to the story.
‘And Carissa, and the Copy medic?’
‘Once we’re certain Quintus is no longer an issue, we will initiate a hard reset on both of them. It will wipe their knowledge, including whatever deep-program commands Quintus gave them. We have synthetics living in the city, so they can be programmed with new personalities and given new lives that have no connection to the network.’
Another mystery.
‘So they won’t die?’
‘They won’t be who they were before, so in a way they do die, but are reborn anew.’
They walked on farther. Agatha ended the tour at a large, closed door spanning at least twenty feet up and ten across.
‘What’s past there?’
Agatha hesitated. ‘The outside.’
‘The city? Your city?’
Agatha nodded. Anya waited for her to show them, but she said, ‘I’ll show you soon, I promise. But first, we need to talk.’
‘When?’
‘After we’ve reset the Copies.’
The City. The Beyond. The Region. Agatha had only shared snippets of what had happened to create the latter. The Region had been her life. Did she really want to know how she’d ended up there?
But the commander’s veiled hints at her former life intrigued her. ‘I’d like to see the city now, if that’s okay.’
Agatha slid her hands in the front pockets of her trousers. She wore a royal-blue suit, a colour that exactly matched the jumpsuits the workers had to wear in the food factories in Essention. Where Jason used to work.
A lump lodged in her throat.
‘Later. The city is not what you will be expecting.’ Agatha walked away from the door. ‘Come on. I’ll take you back.’
Anya and Dom followed her back into the compound. Anya tried to remember the positives. Her friends were okay; that’s all that mattered.
But she wanted to know the whereabouts of two people in particular.
‘Did two people arrive here, last name Hunt?’
Agatha looked back at her and nodded. ‘About four months ago. Why?’
She glanced up at Dom. ‘We knew their son.’
Agatha smiled. ‘They’ll be glad to hear. Not many who cross still have family alive.’
‘He didn’t make it.’
Dom rubbed small circles on her back. She felt the tension in his hand.
Agatha said softly, ‘I’ll tell them.’
‘Can you also tell them something else?’
Agatha stopped and looked at her.
The words wouldn’t come. What did she want to say about the boy who’d been so desperate to succeed he’d tried to rape her? His parents abandoning him had damaged him psychologically; he’d used everyone around him. She could see that now.
Agatha waited for her answer.
‘Tell them he died a hero and they should have trusted him with the truth.’
Anything else was in the past, where it belonged.
Dom leaned closer to her ear. ‘You’re a bigger person than me.�
��
Agatha gave a tight nod. ‘I’ve got some work to do. You two okay on your own?’
It wasn’t like there were many places to venture in the Beyond. But there was one place she wanted to go.
‘Is Alex being released soon?’
‘I hope so. We’re taking precautions at the moment. He was able to pass through the door undetected because our scanners did not pick up the chip implant in his head that Quintus had hijacked. We want to make sure Quintus is fully gone.’
‘I’d like to see him.’
‘That can be arranged.’ Agatha lifted her wrist and spoke into it. ‘Please give Anya Macklin access to the prisoner.’
She nodded at the pair and walked away, leaving Anya and Dom alone in an echo-filled space.
Dom’s deep-brown eyes were filled with worry. ‘Do you want me to come with you?’
They were no longer in danger, but she sensed Dom was still unsettled. So was she. Maybe when they left the base for the new city she’d feel different.
Anya shook her head. ‘I need to talk to him alone. Do you mind?’
He crooked a smile. ‘I’ll catch up with Sheila and June.’
Anya placed a hand on his chest. His heart beat was steady, but she felt a slight shake in his body. ‘Hey, you got us here to safety. Things are good.’
Dom smiled at her, but it didn’t reach his eyes. ‘See you soon.’
He walked away.
Anya followed the corridor to a split and took the left turn. It led her to a new area she had only seen with Agatha as part of their tour. It appeared no place was off limits to her now. That put her mind at ease.
She arrived at a room. Outside, two guards were posted.
One said to her, ‘Agatha said ten minutes.’
He opened the door and she entered a room that held a single bed and a bedside locker. In one corner was a metal chair. The room was as sparse as the dorms in Arcis had been. The grey blanket on the bed and the white walls reminded her of the unit she and Jason had occupied in Essention.
Alex was sitting on the edge of his bed. He looked up when she entered.
His mouth curved up on one side. ‘Hey.’
‘Hey, back.’ She closed the door and pulled the chair over to the bed. ‘How are you feeling?’
Alex smiled sadly. ‘Stupid. I almost got everyone killed.’
