by Nick Thacker
Returning to the stairwell, he handed the device to the man who had killed Stokes, and he walked forward with it. The first guard returned to the computer and began to poke around. Colson noticed a small palm scanner in the drawer, and the man placed his open hand on it and the computer flickered once more, then unlocked. The man set the palm reader to the side on the counter, but closed the drawer and began to work.
As simple as that, Colson thought. He wondered if the three guards they had killed were able to get into the system using the same palm print reader or if it was reserved for the ones in charge. He knew he could hack it, simply by writing a few lines of code that would trick the small device into thinking it was receiving a valid print, effectively bypassing the security measure.
Too late now.
“Monsieur Anderson,” Valére said, addressing the man they had met on Level 2, “please get started with the final connection. Our system will be live in minutes, assuming you have prepared everything?”
“Yes, Mr. Valére,” Anderson said. “Everything is in order.”
“Very well,” Valére said, turning back to Joshua. “Proceed.”
Anderson walked forward and held the helmet upside-down. Colson could see the wires and their terminations dangling from the back of the helmet, and Anderson ran his fingers through them to straighten them out. There was a small panel on the back of the helmet as well, and Anderson poked around on it while the guard was hard at work on the computer.
“It’s working fine, but takes a while to get synced up with the system since it’s a prototype. Once it does, the nodes will activate immediately upon contact.”
Valére looked impatient, but he nodded. “We have about three minutes,” he said, addressing Joshua. “Monsieur Jefferson, at which point I will become part of this infrastructure, and I will lock the doors, gain control of our security system, and ensure that your death will be far more painful than the one I am offering you now. After that, I will be in control of the world’s first biologically structured supercomputer. You may not grasp what that means, but every thought, every desire, and every instinct I have will be merely a millisecond away from becoming action. So I will ask you one more time, then, why are you here, and who sent you?”
Joshua looked around at the others — Colson, Reggie, Mrs. E, and Julie — ignoring Valére’s pistol held to his head. He sighed, then stared at Valére. “We just found it. We were walking around out here, and there was a door, and —“
Valére had motioned for the guard at the computer to join him, and the guard immediately interpreted the order. He hit Joshua, cracking his knuckles on the man’s face. Colson grimaced, but Joshua remained standing.
“That is funny, Joshua,” Valére said. “You will also find it funny that just before I arrived onsite a man did just that, stumbling here from McMurdo Station and somehow finding one of our security access hatches. We took him in, of course, and he has proven to be a valuable asset to our system.”
The guard hit him again while Valére continued. “You really should not lie, son. You have never been good at it. For your brother, it was a decent skill. But he is no longer with us, correct?”
“His death is your fault.”
“No, Joshua,” Valére said immediately. “His death is your fault. You shot him, and you left him. Not even a proper burial for your own family?”
Valére spoke to Anderson once more, and Anderson nodded. “Yes, sir,” he said. “When the nodes come into contact with the skull, they will immediately send the access signal to the system. You will be in full control of SARA and the station. But…”
Valére looked at his subordinate with a calm, concerned expression on his face.
“But you will no longer be able…” the man seemed distraught, as if he couldn’t even finish his own thought.
Valére brought his hand up to the man’s shoulder and rested it there. “Yes, Anderson. That is correct. But this is my dream, my friend. This is what I have planned for. To wake her up, once and for all. But I will not go — she will have my own conscience. We will finally be one.”
“Where is Ben?” Julie blurted out suddenly. Colson glanced at her, silently urging her to stop talking. They didn’t need to push their luck.
“Monsieur Bennett?” Valére responded. He turned and stared coolly at Colson. “I was informed upon my arrival that you, Jonathan, were to be instated into the system downstairs. Since there was an opening, I thought it rather convenient to store Monsieur Bennett there, in your stead.”
Julie didn’t respond, but Colson could feel her pain. He knew exactly how she would be feeling right now, because he felt it. He felt betrayed, lost, confused, and above all, angry. The company he had worked for down here had led him on. It had led them all on, and this man, this decrepit, dying, crippled old man had been pulling all the strings.
Two more guards walked out of the stairwell and joined Valére, standing just behind their leader. Anderson turned and acknowledged the newcomers, a question on his face.
One of the new guards nodded, a slight smile on his face, and Anderson whispered to Valére.
“Very good, thank you,” Valére said. He turned to Julie and smiled, a genuine look of joy on his face. “Then this day will not end poorly.”
He had them where he wanted them, and there was nothing any of them could do about it. Colson felt trapped, and he wondered if anyone else had come up with a way out. Looking around, it did not appear as though anyone had. Joshua, Julie and Mrs. E were staring blankly at Valére and the men working on the helmet device, and Reggie was peering up at the hovering death-drones awaiting the command to open fire.
“Time is up, Joshua,” Valére said. He looked at Anderson the guard at the computer terminal, both of whom were the human versions of the drones — awaiting their master’s command. “Let us begin.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-three
Reggie was watching the man named Valére discuss with his guards when something caught his eye. He was closest to the stairwell, but he was facing the men in the center of the circle formed by the drones, still hovering around them.
There was a shadow, just a blink of an arm, standing inside the stairwell out of sight. Reggie flicked his eyes to the right, trying to get a look at it without alerting any of the four guards or Valére or his protege, Anderson, to it. There was nothing there.
But he had seen something, he was sure of it. His training, his career teaching others how to survive in the wild, and his life of experience observing the world around him had made him incredibly observant. When most people would be focusing on only what their eyes depicted in a wide line immediately in front of them, Reggie had been trained to use his peripheral vision in the same way, constantly reaching to the edge of his vision for any motion whatsoever.
For that reason, he was prepared. He gripped the rifle tighter, the weapon still devoid of ammunition. He used a technique he liked to call ‘locking in.’ He focused on Valére and Anderson, letting his eyes rest without moving them to allow anything in his entire frame of vision to jump out at his consciousness. It was like an inherent alarm system, built into humans and animals, that many people had no idea how to use. It was useful for examining and observing a scene, helping him take into consideration the movements everyone else was taking.
He noticed a few things. First, Valére and Anderson, as well as one of the guards, were busy getting the helmet object ready to place on Valére’s head. Another guard was standing by at the computer, watching the screen.
That left two guards, the new arrivals, both facing away from the doorway toward their bosses and Reggie’s group, spread out in a semi-circle around Valére. The drones hovered, moving and dipping in the air as they constantly worked to maintain a fixed position.
And then he saw movement again. A shadow again, flicking out and back. There was someone behind the wall, he knew. Without a doubt, a person was standing behind the wall of the stairwell.
He gripped the gun tighter. It wa
sn’t loaded, but it would be better than fists if it came to that.
Anderson lowered the helmet toward Valére’s head. He stood almost a foot taller than the short older man, and Valére waited, an impatient smile on his face, eyes closed.
The helmet was an inch away when Ben made his move. The ‘locked in’ alarms in Reggie’s mind began sounding, and he flicked his head slightly to watch Ben’s motion. One of the guards caught his eye, startled by Reggie’s new focal point, but it was too late.
Ben reached Anderson and simply pulled the helmet out of his hands. The man, startled by the helmet’s sudden disappearance, froze. Ben took advantage of the opportunity and plopped the helmet onto Anderson’s head and pushed Valére away, then fell to the ground.
Joshua and Julie rushed forward, snapping into action when Ben hit the floor. They ran forward to help him, but one of the guards was already on his way to the same location, aiming for Valére. Their paths were going to collide, and Reggie watched as Joshua ducked a bit and held his head back, getting into position for a perfect tackle.
Reggie had also started running, veering left to take out one of the guards closest to him who was now swinging his rifle around toward Ben.
Reggie and Joshua collided with their targets at almost exactly the same time, and the matching pops sounded louder to Reggie than a gunshot. His man fell, carried forward by Reggie who had wrapped him up and left the ground just before his head pummeled the guard’s side. He lost his grip on his empty rifle upon impact, but he was intent on taking the man out anyway. He felt a few ribs crack, and could hear the man groan as they fell in a heap just feet away from Ben.
The drones began to dance and rotate in the air, and Reggie instinctively kept his head down, preparing for the attack.
There was a gunshot, and then another, but he ignored the sound for the moment and continued aiming his efforts and focus on the man below him. He grabbed the guard’s hair and smacked his forehead down, hard, on the floor. The satisfying sound told Reggie the man was finished, and that he could move on to the next unfortunate target.
Julie was helping Ben, trying to resuscitate the large man who was passed out on the floor near Reggie’s guard and Valére. For his part, Valére was anxiously snapping a finger and urging one of the guards to give him a hand. His mouth was opening and closing, and Reggie thought he looked like a fish on a dock, frantically trying to breath air.
Reggie would have laughed at the helplessness of the older man, but he was quickly preoccupied with the guard aiming a rifle at his head.
He rolled, dodging the first burst of shots, and took cover next to the computer terminal. The dead guard that had been laying there was still on the ground in front of the terminal, gunless and lifeless, but there was something else he had that interested Reggie. He reached out and pocketed the flash grenade, knowing that it might come in handy at some point.
Three more rounds hit the side of the computer terminal’s rack, banging into the hard metal components and sparking as they lodged themselves deep into the side of a sliding drawer. Reggie was glad to have the cover, and he took the time to assess the situation. He could see Valére’s feet, unmoving, and he wondered if the man had fallen asleep or was just waiting for help. Next to him, Anderson was spinning in circles, slowly and deliberately, the helmet lit up and whirring with noise as it sat on his head. Reggie had no idea what was happening, but Anderson did not seem to even realize he was standing in the middle of a battle zone, completely unarmed.
He was about to lunge toward the fight when a guard suddenly appeared in front of him, gun drawn and pointing at his forehead.
CHAPTER SIXTY-four
After escaping the drawer and ripping the metal snakelike tube from his throat, Ben lay on the level’s hard, cold floor, breathing and thinking. He had survived one terror just to lead to ten others, and such had been the style of this trip. Ever since setting foot on the continent, things around here seemed inclined to try to kill him and his group.
He had been told he was resilient, first by his father long ago, then his mother, then a whole slew of others as he became an adult. Initially it was a word he didn’t understand completely, and he had assumed it was used as their way to give an otherwise unassuming, ‘relatively normal’ man a compliment without telling him the full truth — that he was unassuming and relatively normal.
Upon exiting his prison, he had almost laughed. He wondered if he was meant to die here, frozen at the bottom of the earth, and if so why he was being strung along to suffer until it finally happened. He was, against all odds and every ounce of logic in him, alive. Broken, tired, and angry, but alive.
And he needed to find Julie.
Their mission here had been compromised the minute the Chinese set foot in the station, and he wondered if their mission hadn’t been a ruse all along, a sleight of hand or misdirection. Perhaps Mr. E and his wife, or whoever was really behind all of this, were simply using Ben’s team to accomplish a more nefarious plan than what Draconis themselves were up to.
Again, none of that mattered for Ben. He stumbled to the stairs and gripped the railing with his right hand, the only one that seemed to be working properly. As he climbed to the next level, he assessed the damages.
One more punch, he assumed, would have killed him. He felt like even a puff of air would do the trick. His legs were the only part of him that weren’t completely trashed, but they seemed to be just as hesitant to exert themselves, for fear that they might call attention to themselves. His left shoulder was nothing more than a knot, holding his arm hostage as it hung lifeless on his side, and his right shoulder was barely better. His face would be unrecognizable, he knew, and he wondered what his broken nose would look like after it healed.
In all, Ben was a wreck. He was ready to be done, and part of him continued walking upstairs because it might lead to his death, short and sweet, if he encountered any of the Chinese or security teams.
But the other part of him was really the side pulling him forward, and as much as he tried to deny it, he was doing it to continue fighting. His battle wasn’t over yet, and the prison cabinet had given him time to think and recover enough to remember what had drawn him here in the first place.
After realizing and remembering that element, he understood something deeper: he was no longer concerned with destroying Draconis Industries and getting his revenge. He wanted justice, but it was no longer his single motivating force. Instead, the emotion and thought that now crawled all over him, just as purposefully as the metal snake, was something harder to identify.
He had pushed his legs forward, up and onto the stairwell, and toward the door. He could hear voices, the same man’s who had confronted him in the chair, and then Joshua’s.
He remembered the group, and thought about their own reasons for coming along. Joshua had a personal interest in uprooting the company he and his family had worked for, but Ben knew his reasons ran deeper as well.
At the edge of the stairs he waited, trying to hear the man’s explanation and argument, judging the gaps and lulls in the conversation, then he made his move.
He had tripped coming out, but his feet recovered and provided the last few steps to Valére’s position, where he was standing with the younger man they had met up on Level 2. Ben had ripped the helmet out of his hands and placed it on the head of the younger man.
He had felt himself falling, so he threw his arm forward and pushed Valére. A petty move, but it was enough to make Ben smile as he connected with the floor.
Suddenly Julie was there, kneeling over him. He hadn’t seen her when he’d first entered the room and started the attack, and he wasn’t entirely sure she was real, even now.
She was talking to him, prodding him, trying to get him to respond. His eyes wouldn’t move, one glued shut and the other locked straight up to the ceiling.
“Ben,” she said again, her voice cracking.
“U — uh…” he said.
“What?”
He wondered if she realized there were guns and drones and security guards everywhere around them, as well as a strange electronic helmet that was causing the younger man to hallucinate and wiggle around right above them, but he couldn’t say all of that. He wondered if she could hear those things, and see that they were still in danger, and that he wanted to take her away and protect her, and that he wanted to…
“Marry me.”
He forced his eye to find her, just a silhouette with a single hanging light far away as a backdrop, her hair a mess and her face a black outline, and he tried to smile. It came out looking more like he had had a stroke, judging by the quick instant of shock on her face.
CHAPTER SIXTY-five
If he had learned anything in the past twenty-four hours, Jonathan Colson knew that his odds of staying alive greatly improved when he was with the group now comprised of Reggie, Mrs. E, Joshua, Julie, and Ben.
He had watched as Valére had gone down, attacked from behind by a ragged, bleeding Ben. Anderson was spinning slowly in circles after Ben put the helmet on his head, but Colson wasn’t sure what exactly was going on. He knew the drones were still hovering, awaiting their signal to attack, and he knew the guards were engaged in a fight with his group, but he didn’t want to be off to one side by himself.
Colson took the chance and jumped forward into a lumbering run, right across the center of the circle now filled with Valére’s body, his mouth agape and his arm in the air, and Anderson, still spinning. He saw Reggie and Joshua each tackle the guards closest to them, and he hurdled Valére’s legs and kept running. He was nearly at the computer control station when a guard stepped out in front of it and started pointing his gun down.
Directly at Reggie, who was unarmed and hiding behind the terminal.
