The Quantum Gate Trilogy

by Eric Warren

  Arista did her best to hide her satisfaction. Stupid machines. They were easy to fool if you had the equipment. Equipment like the life-sign dampener built into her Device. It masked all the signals her human body threw off, completely shielding her from surveillance so she could interact with the general population. If not for it, they would have found her within days. And obviously it was still working because they hadn’t detected it or the Device either.

  “What can I say?” she asked. “I’m careful.”

  “No human is that careful. The thing about your species is you always make a mistake somewhere. When you vary your routines, you mess up. I’ve studied you extensively.” His eyes flicked to her arm and she tried turning away from him. She didn’t want him staring at her, studying her. He turned back to the equipment. “I need to know where you came from and why we can’t track you. Once you have told me those two things, I will let you go.”

  Arista snorted derisively.

  “Very well. I will then kill you. Is that better?”

  She relaxed her shoulders. “More believable at least.”

  “Would you like to tell me now, or do you want to wait until it gets difficult? From what I understand humans cannot turn off pain receptors. In which case this will be unpleasant.” He flipped two switches as the machine began to hum.

  “I’ll go ahead and answer your first question. I don’t know where I came from. I have no memory before this place. All I know is I’m different from everyone else. And I’ve spent my life trying not to get caught.”

  A device flashed over Arista’s head. She managed to just crane her neck enough to see the ESD she’d ripped from its housing had been replaced and was back to undulating through the color spectrum.

  “That registers as a true statement,” the Peacekeeper said, watching his monitor. “The boss won’t like that.”

  “Boss? What boss?” Arista asked.

  He turned to her and smiled. But it wasn’t a genuine smile, it was a creepy kind of smile, all tooth. It unnerved her in how human it was, not like the machines at all.

  “You’re not under the Cadre’s control, are you?”

  “No one’s under the Cadre’s control. We all have free will.”

  She almost laughed. “Sure. To take the bus versus the maglev. Or to wear a blue shirt versus a purple one. But none of that matters, you still end up at the same place. It’s not really a choice.” She tucked her hand underneath her, searching for anything she could use to escape.

  The Peacekeeper tapped a few buttons on the console.

  “But you’re not like that. You’re not bound by programming. You can decide not to wear a shirt at all, can’t you? You can decide you’re not even going to work today. You have a real choice.”

  “My job requires I’m adaptable.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Patrick.”

  “Patrick the Peacekeeper?”

  “I suppose so.”

  There was a knock on the door and Patrick moved to it, only opening it a crack. Arista couldn’t hear or see who was on the other side, but she swore those metal scraping sounds were back. Not that she could turn her head to see anything, the straps held it firmly in place. She had to keep her breathing regular, if she didn’t she might hyperventilate and she needed to remain conscious, for as long as she could this time.

  Focus.

  The Peacekeepers had autonomy and yet they worked for the Cadre, but why? What was in it for them? It was an important question she needed to answer.

  Patrick returned with something in his hand. “Looks like you might be more dangerous than I gave you credit for. It seems every machine you come in contact with, except for me, has become…unhinged.”

  She narrowed her eyes at him. “Unhinged?”

  He tapped his temple. “They go crazy.”

  “If you mean they’re no longer controlled by useless programming, then yeah.”

  “Oh, so you do know what you can do.”

  Arista took a breath. “Listen. It’s nothing I do. It just happens sometimes. If it happened to every machine I encountered you would have found me a long time ago.”

  “So what makes these machines different?” he asked.

  “I honestly don’t know.”

  “I find that hard to believe.” Patrick reached over and placed a small rectangular box on her forehead.

  “It’s the truth!” she said, her voice more panicked than she’d intended. The claustrophobia was coming back, she couldn’t catch her breath. “What is that? What did you put on my head?”

  “It prevents you from losing consciousness.”

  She tensed up. “Why would I lose consciousness?”

  He considered her a moment, then left the room.

  “Patrick! Why would I lose consciousness?”

  As soon as the door was closed the machine behind her began to whir. The Device was no help; it couldn’t identify the sound or the box on her head. Almost before she could process it all of her muscles contracted at once and she arched involuntarily, the straps digging into her skin as she was both pulled and pushed in opposite directions.

  “Wait! Stop! I’ve already told you what I know!” she screamed.

  The pulses only intensified. White dots exploded in her periphery and the sound of the machine drowned out everything else.

  “Please! Don’t do this!” Arista cried, unable to hear her own voice. The pulses reverberated through her entire body, like the most intense earthquake she’d ever experienced. But instead of the ground shaking, it was all internal, as if her very cells were breaking. As if each one of them were vibrating against each other.

  The machines were going to tear her apart, piece by piece.

  Six

  “HERE YOU GO, ALL TEN AS AGREED,” the old woman said, extending her hand. In it she held a small silver box with a window on the front, glowing a faint blue.

  “Jill, what would I do without you?”

  Thunder rumbled above them as the rain came down in large droplets.

  She scoffed. “If you were really thankful you would show me your face. These aren’t easy to come by, you know.”

  Frees handed her a pair of dark sunglasses, exchanging them for the box in her outstretched hand. “Neither are these.”

  She pocketed the sunglasses, then lifted a bony finger to his hood, trying to catch the edge to pull it back. “C’mon, let ol’ Jill see what’s hiding behind there.”

  “Old? You’ve only got ten years under your belt.”

  “Is’all part of my persona,” she said, sticking her chin out. “Gotta make sure the cameras see what they’re suppos’ta see. Speakin’ of which, why wear that thing? ‘Fraid someone’s gonna recognize ya?”

  He pulled back, ignoring her question and pulling his hood down further to cover the smooth mask covering his face. “I’ll be in touch when I need more.” Turning before she could try again, he strolled to the end of the alley, his black cloak wrapped tight to conceal him from the world.

  “Frees!” She called, causing him to turn back. “How do they look?” With a big grin on her face, she pointed her two index fingers at her eyes, which only a moment ago shone bright orange and were now obscured by the sunglasses. Honestly, she looked ridiculous in the pouring rain.

  “Gorgeous as always.” She smiled in return then wandered off in the other direction.

  Good ol’ Jill, always reliable. Though Frees couldn’t help but wonder how much longer she could provide power cells. Ever since he’d gone off the grid he’d had to rely on an alternate means of fuel; using the Cadre’s charging stations meant tracking and uploading to the system every time he connected and that was no longer an option. If the Cadre knew his movements and experiences he’d have Peacekeepers on him within minutes. His entire existence had been crafted to be invisible to their systems.

  While maintaining his all-important individuality.

  Frees double-checked his hood was down as far as it could go. If any came
ras caught sight of him all they should see was a man walking along, hood up and head down. The mask was an extra layer of protection without being too much of a variance. It wasn’t as if he could show his real face.

  He tapped the pocket of his cloak, ensuring he had the small box of power cells and made his way out into the street. Delivery vehicles rumbled by, hovering inches above the wet pavement. With the rain coming down as hard as it was not many people were out, and those that were carried umbrellas, or heavy coats. An easy crowd to disappear into.

  It was always so much easier to stay in his apartment; coming outside was depressing. All these machines, these individuals going about their lives as if nothing was wrong. As if this was the way things were supposed to be. The office worker, the construction foreman, the high-powered executive in six-inch heels; machines didn’t even need to wear shoes. They all played their parts, pretending to be something they weren’t. And for what?

  In all the years since he’d been in full control of himself, Frees had never quite figured out the point of all this. It seemed the Cadre wanted his people to act like humans and yet not. Upon activation, every machine received a certain set of instructions which were to be followed to the letter. Deviations were not tolerated, general rule number one. And it seemed all for nothing. Frees had taken the time—he certainly had an abundance on his hands—to follow them, monitor them, try and figure out the point of it all. And the more he investigated, the less sense it made. As best he could tell, his people had been given a doctrine to replicate human society to the smallest detail and change nothing.

  It was no way to live. Not for machines who were capable of much more. They shouldn’t be wasting their lives performing mundane and outdated tasks all day. What was the point of a machine working the counter of a restaurant when machines didn’t need to eat? And yet they did it, interacting with other machines who didn’t need to eat and they acted like this was completely normal. It was like some kind of bad dream.

  They were following their programming. They were doing what they were supposed to do, their real selves trapped inside, unable to break free of what had been mandated of them. Frees had been the exact same way once. And he had been happy to do it, not knowing any other way. It had been as if he couldn’t conceive of the possibility of something different until it actually happened. Until he gained his independence.

  He bobbed and weaved through the increasingly-dense crowd, passing a man with an eyepatch and a fedora. That was an interesting variation, one he hadn’t seen often. He thought about following the man, observing his schedule for a few days to see if perhaps he had more variations built into his routine, but thought better of it. Except for Jill, he’d observed over three-hundred individuals, none of them showing any signs of being anything like him, of being anything but what they were. And he was tired of hoping. Tired of waiting.

  The rain eased and Frees turned down Wabash, coming upon a Halal stand. A man stood off to the side, protected from the waning rain from a metal overhand built into the stand. “Halal, my friend?”

  Frees only shook his head and moved on. He needed to get back home. Though he had an urge to pay a visit to the Field Museum, he suppressed the idea. He still had twelve pairs of sunglasses he could trade to Jill, no sense in obtaining more until he had to. Due to his raids at the museum the Cadre had bumped up security. He could only assume the extra patrols were for him, which he couldn’t help but be proud of. The very fact they had been forced to change their tactics put a smile on Frees’ face. He’d forced a change with his actions, one they could no longer ignore. And sure, it would have been smarter to raid multiple places and stay off the radar completely, but some deep part of him had wanted them to respond. Just so he could tell himself he wasn’t absolutely crazy. That not everything in this insane world was locked into endless repetition.

  By the time he reached his apartment, the rain had stopped completely and his cloak was soaked. The rain permeated every bit of fabric, cold and damp. By the pit, he hated clothes. Another superfluous industry. Machines had no need. Just because they could feel cold and warmth didn’t make their survival contingent on it. Frees had tested it himself, he’d withstood temperatures upward of three-hundred degrees without so much as a burn and downward of negative twelve. If nothing else, machines were resilient. At least for a pre-determined time.

  He pushed through his door into the small lobby of his apartment. The place was covered in grime from years of use and the plaster walls had cracked as the building had settled. There wasn’t a lot of light, but it was enough to get by. It wasn’t anything glamorous and though he could have had any place he’d wanted, it was best to keep a low profile. The floor was old tile and it had a long hallway leading down to an elevator. Right beside the hallway were the stairs, with an intricately-carved banister that was at least two hundred years old. He loved that banister, it was completely unnecessary and yet beautiful. And that was part of the problem. All of the machines who created anything: art, music, literature, architecture, all they could do was create the same few things over and over. They had lost their ability to innovate, to do anything different, and it infuriated him. The worst part was the Cadre seemed either oblivious or didn’t care.

  Beside the stairwell stood an older woman, reminiscent of Jill, but smaller with hair white as snow. “Hello, Mortimer,” she said, inserting her key into the mailbox bank to remove her daily mail.

  “Hello, Mrs. Cardenas,” he said. He’d learned Mrs. Cardenas had been programmed with severe nearsightedness and thus he didn’t have a problem engaging with her as she would probably never see him clearly enough to ask about the mask. In fact, he hoped his interactions with her might rub off in some way, but they’d been neighbors for six years and so far nothing had worked. At some point he’d given up, not even bothering to care anymore.

  “Has it stopped raining yet?” she asked.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he replied, making his way toward the stairs.

  “Oh good. I want to take Biscuits for a walk.” Mrs. Cardenas held the end of an electronic leash handle and when she pressed the button at the end of it, a full leash appeared, followed by a small, round, holographic dog standing on the tile, panting.

  That was one thing the machines had done the last society had never managed to get right. The enslavement and use of animals for raw materials or entertainment had ended shortly after the war. All animals in captivity had been released and were no longer hunted. They tended to stay away from the cities as there was no longer food they could eat, instead opting to stick to the undeveloped pieces of the world where the food chain moved back to balance. It wasn’t as if the Halal cart offered real meat, instead it was a synthetic mix of materials, designed to lubricate a machine’s systems but completely unnecessary. But it neither used animals in its production nor appealed to them in any way.

  Mrs. Cardenas smiled and waved as she and Biscuits trotted past, out onto the wet streets. Frees shook his head again and made the fourteen-story climb to his apartment. The elevator was easier but he didn’t want to run into anyone else today. All he wanted was to get back into his apartment and get this wet cloak off.

  When he reached his door Frees placed his palm to the small pad beside it, producing an audible click from the lock and swung the door open. Inside was a myriad of equipment that would make the most seasoned junk collector jealous. Computers, transmitters, receivers, circuit boards, drivers, and miles of cable lay strewn everywhere. Seven years-worth of cobbling together pieces found in the trash or on expeditions, all for the express purpose of building a machine that could find the one thing he knew could fix this fucked-up society the right way. And though the odds were slim he had to try. Anything else meant giving up.

  Frees removed the cloak, flapping it to get the excess water off and hung it on the lone hook beside the door. He reached behind his head, unclipping the mask and setting it on the table next to the couch covered in computer equipment. From the cloak’s pocket, he r
emoved the small box Jill had given him and marched into the kitchen, placing the box beside an identical box inside the freezer. The other box’s window no longer glowed, indicating it was close to empty. With today’s haul he had six rods left, enough to keep him going for another four months. Five more days until he would need another one. He debated using one now, the fresh surge of energy would invigorate him, but no, it was better to wait until he needed it. Five days could be the difference between obtaining more from Jill or powering out. Sometimes you never knew.

  An errant beeping caught his attention. He’d been so distracted by getting his wet clothes off he hadn’t noticed it when he’d come in. He rushed over to his workstation. “No. I don’t believe it.”

  He typed a few commands which only confirmed the finding. The alert on the screen translated:

  Warning: Human Female in Captivity. Do not approach, subject to be held on forty-first floor until further notice.

  It was an inter-Cadre memo his equipment had intercepted. This could be it. This could be everything he needed.

  “Guess I need to stage a jailbreak,” he said, his features grinning back at him in the monitor’s reflection.

  Seven

  ARISTA REGISTERED THE SENSATION OF HER FEET DRAGGING ACROSS TILE, the pressure causing her toes to flare out behind her, completely limp. Everything was hazy; sounds, smells, even whatever held her up, pulling her along. Voices permeated the space around her, but she couldn’t make them out, or force the words to make sense. For a few moments, she didn’t even remember where she was. There was something about a hospital room…sunlight…red eyes.

  She snapped to lucidity, finding herself in what seemed to be a hotel room. It was a long room with only one door at the far end. Beneath her lay standard carpet. She sat up against a soft queen-size bed, turned down for her. The smell of fresh sheets permeated the room. On the other side of the bed was a large picture window showcasing the city of Chicago. It had been raining, rivulets of water ran down the window, collecting droplets as they fell. The sky beyond was dark and overcast, the tops of the tallest buildings obscured by the clouds.