by J. J. Lorden
As the NexU seats had adaptive bracing, he was accustomed to being held snug, no matter the cornering force. Being a passenger in the VX, without that advantage and with no steering wheel to brace against, the loop of steel was his anchor point.
It had nothing to do with fear. Beyond trusting Racheal’s skill, even sitting shotgun he could still feel the road, still feel that edge of grip and how she kept them right on it.
It’d been a wild ride, and Austin loved every second.
He looked back to check on Matty. His pizza-loving bud, sitting centerline in the singular rear seat, had arms crossed over his sternum with white-knuckled hands clenched around the harness straps at his collarbone.
He looked like someone stuck on a runaway carnival ride.
“You Okay, back there, man? Not going to throw up or anything, are you?”
Matty’s eyes reluctantly met his. “N…n… No.”
“Damn Matty, you’re a mess. Sorry bud. Maybe try some deep breaths to calm your nerves?”
“G... g… good idea.” Matty closed his eyes as he started breathing long and slow. Regular involuntary quavers shook his body. Austin grimaced; he’d forgotten how severely Matty reacted to dangerous driving. His friend calmed a bit and added, “Fuck you guys.”
Austin smirked. “That’s my boy.”
Racheal’s gut-rending performance had covered the sixty-minute drive in twenty. She had bought him plenty of time to stop the absentee reset protocol and quelled his fear of losing almost three years of work. For that, he would gladly deal with Matty’s ire.
What he would have preferred, though, was Racheal approaching the gate with a bit more caution. Her zero-margin-for-error, racing-style stop had nearly given Olli, the gate guard, a reason to shoot them.
Or, more accurately, Racheal’s car may have been locked down. Olli’s rifle didn’t shoot bullets.
Either way, an aggressive response was probably the logical choice when a midnight-black car, going 160, was charging the front gate. The fact that Racheal’s ride was unharmed despite this, was a testimony to the man on duty.
Olli was crouched defensively beyond the tinted glass. His rifle was slung, and he leveled a black rod at the unseen occupants. “Roll your window down. Now!”
Still grinning, Racheal did, and Austin leaned across the center consul. The car sat too low for Olli to see the passenger side otherwise.
“Evening, Olli,” Austin said apologetically. Upon seeing Austin, Olli immediately put up the benign appearing weapon, Austin knew it was anything but, and squatted on his heels to get an eye-level view into the car.
“Holy Christ, Austin. I nearly popped ya’ll. That was one hell-of-a way to pull up to my gate.” He eyed Racheal, whose grin had lessened only slightly, and cocked his head sideways. A dangerous little smile crept into his expression. “Racheal.”
She eyed him and nodded. “Olli.”
His eyes danced slightly, then turning away, Olli opened the gate and waved them through, calling out to Austin as he did. “We need to grab a beer sometime, little brother. I’d love to get caught up.”
As Racheal pulled ahead, Austin called back, “Definitely, Olli. I’ll be in touch soon.”
Austin and Olli had an easy friendship and hung out frequently. Austin sincerely appreciated him–aside from Matty and Racheal, Olli was his closest friend. It didn’t hurt that the security pro had a keen interest in Austin’s VR project.
The big, affable man was a fantastic thinker, and trusted by Bendik, so Austin had looped him in on the secret. When he needed to talk out a challenging problem, Olli was his go-to guy. Even though the security guard wasn’t a programmer, he listened intently and asked insightful questions.
Their talks helped Austin parse his thoughts, clarifying his thinking to find needed answers. That capacity was why Olli knew more about Kuora than anyone, even Matty and Racheal.
Olli’s professional life was the thing people referred to when they used the phrase “black box”.
It was the same for nearly every retired spec-ops guy, their resumés were riddled with top secret information. To those who understood how to read between the lines, the rule of thumb was: the more obscure, the more qualified. It was an inverse relationship that ensured the most experienced commandos were hired only by those who truly needed their help.
An interview of someone like Olli consisted of questions about insinuated but unconfirmed violence. Olli and his ilk would respond to these with either silence and a flat stare or silence and a mysterious smile. In both cases, the silence was a given, and the real responses had to be implied from body language or from how the former military men redirected the conversation.
For instance, if they redirected to talk about a spontaneous family vacation to the beach–that might indicate involvement with a covert, small team assault over a beach. Austin knew about these word games because Olli had explained them to him.
As resumés came, Olli’s was a black hole, lacking even the command names under which he’d served. In that vacuum of information, his initial hire was based upon a personal recommendation from the then-acting Secretary of Defense.
After being hired, Olli had swiftly become the head of security for all of Texier Quantum Labs and a close confidant to Austin’s father. During that time, their friendship had been basically cordial.
Then, within a day of Bendik’s disappearance, Olli had shown up here, at Texier’s covert research lab deep in the woods of Maine.
No longer running security for the company, Olli suddenly had a bunch of time on his hands and was always around the facility. Their friendship had sparked effortlessly.
To Austin, the relocation had seemed like a huge demotion. But when asked, Olli didn’t have any issue with it. According to him, it was: “Nice to have some time to relax.”
During this past couple years, and through their many sit-downs over fish-and-chips, drinking beer, combat training, and crafting in Austin’s shop, their bond had deepened.
Just this last year, Olli had even invited him to a New Year’s celebration on a private island with several of his ex-squad mates, all of whom now worked for Texier Security. He was the only non-insider allowed, and consequentially, listened and observed much more than he spoke.
There had been six of them total: Olli, Kevin, JT, Bart, Slider, and Austin. Slider probably had a real name, but nobody used it.
On the first night, Austin learned that the former elite military pros enjoyed a truly scary level of roguish pranks. Olli had woken him around 4 am with a devious grin and a signal to get up and follow.
Austin, Olli, JT, Bart, and Slider silently cleared sand from around Kevin’s tent, revealing a pre-staged wooden platform. The five of them lifted the platform, sand, tent, and sleeping ex-commando straight up and stealthily carried the whole business to an awaiting raft on the leeward side of the island.
After settling the tent on the raft, Olli put a weathered section of wooden plank just outside the flap and whispered, “Paddle” in Austin’s ear. Then they pushed their sleeping teammate out into the ocean and watched Kevin and his tent float away. The silence was pierced by occasional muted chuckles.
When Olli judged it was far enough that their voices wouldn’t wake Kevin, he looked at Austin, winked, and said, “I’ll take two-to-one odds that he abandons the tent and swims. That plank is gonna be shit as a paddle.”
Bart took the bet.
Three hours later, he lost that bet.
Kevin climbed out of the ocean with no raft in sight, slicked his hair back, blew out his nose, and sauntered over to the group.
Everyone was sitting around an early-morning fire while Slider cooked up a wicked mix of eggs, veggies, and chorizo.
Apparently, it was Kevin’s turn in the devilish game, because the group held the silence, watching his approach and waiting. Kevin looked them over, expression flat and dangerous; then, as if he couldn’t keep up the charade, his face split with a huge smile, completely genuine a
s far as Austin could tell.
“Early swim today, fellas. The water was just too perfect,” Kevin announced. Then he pulled the wood plank out of the back of his shorts and tossed it to Olli. “I think you lost this, bro.” And he sat down.
The group burst into laughter and cheers, Kevin enjoying it just as much as the others.
Austin had later asked Olli about the prank, pointing out that it was incredibly impractical, not to mention dangerous, and from Austin’s perspective, terrifying.
In particular, he was flabbergasted by Kevin’s happy reaction. The man had awoken in the middle of the ocean, had to abandon all his gear, and then swim several miles back to the island.
“Who does shit like that?” Austin asked, utterly perplexed.
Olli explained, “Kevin is probably the guy I trust most in the world. He’s saved my ass on at least a dozen occasions. Dude is like the rock of Gibraltar. I can’t think of anything better than setting his ass adrift to show him that.
“In my crew, we only screw with the ones we love. It’s a sign of respect. And Kevin ate it up. That prank was epic. He loves me for it. And the fucking plank! He brought the plank back! How can you not love that crazy bastard?”
Austin got this strange logic in a certain way, but his mind got hung up on the logistics. “Kevin set up his own tent, though. How?”
Olli responded with a devious smile and lightly tapped his temple with one finger. “Head games.”
Austin made a mental note to watch his thoughts around Olli.
There had been a couple of other pranks that weekend. A live scorpion in Bart’s eggs, which he ate with a grin and a thanks. Blank rounds shoved into the bottom of a Bratwurst when Slider turned his back to grab a beer. When the blanks erupted in a spray of German sausage, Slider flinched, then started laughing.
Austin considered the experience to be a great privilege and left the weekend in awe of the bond the men shared. He hoped one day to be someone who could have a similar group of friends.
All of the stories, relived operational mishaps, and close calls they bantered over that weekend also revealed to Austin a bit more about who Olli was. He’d been able to glean that the team’s incredible operational record was in no small measure due to Olli’s inhuman sniper skills and situational awareness.
To a man, Olli’s team swore he could see through walls and around corners. Bart commented that, head-to-head, he’d put his life savings on Olli in a sniper duel against anyone.
Nowadays, Olli carried himself like a gentle giant, at least when he wasn’t being directly threatened by a screaming race car.
Austin had taken everything in, though, and imagined himself being Olli. Imagined who he needed to be for Bart to say that, for the squad to swear he could see the impossible–for his crew, Bendik, and the Sec Def to trust him implicitly. Who would he have to be for those things to be true?
Since then, Austin had been clear, one part of Olli was a stalwart guardian and another an incomparable monster.
His relaxed demeanor and good-natured spirit were part of a persona grounded in lethal confidence.
For some reason, none of this intimidated Austin. He was just proud to call him a friend.
7
Grak
Texier Quantum Labs Research Facility and Q-Core Node Host
Parking Lot
May 13, 2064—World Seed plus 6 days, 23 hours, 23 minutes
Austin and his friends loped up to the squat, three-story building nestled into the surrounding forest. Everything about the dark concrete building was benign; everything except for the front wall and ceiling of the atrium lobby.
All three stories were a single, seamless sheet of crystal-clear glass. Even the entry door hardware was made of flat-black, graphene infused materials that seemed to disappear into the surrounding wall.
In the middle of the woods and offset by the flat concrete, it was an arresting sight.
Approaching the entrance while his friends waited, Austin stepped into the security check point, nothing but a plate of steel set into the sidewalk. The symphony of night peepers and cicadas vanished as a shell of active noise canceling sprang into being.
A soft female voice addressed him, “Facial and retinal scans cleared. The after-hours security protocol is in effect. Security phrase, please.”
“Austin Texier rocks a mean machete.”
A brass chime acknowledged his answer.
Before the QI welcomed him, Austin added, “Betsy, I have two guests with me, Racheal Rangalier, and Matteo Oswald. You have them on file. Please clear them to sublevel 37.” The chirping song of the night woods returned.
“Welcome, Austin. I acknowledge your companions Racheal and Matteo are with you as guests, and you’ve cleared them to sublevel 37. Welcome, Racheal. Welcome, Matteo.”
“Thanks, Betts. Brilliant as always,” Matty said.
The clear door slid aside, emitting a steady flow of cool, fresh air.
“You are welcome, Matteo,” Betsy answered.
Dim floor-level lighting came on, warming the vaulted three-story lobby just enough to see.
Their footfalls on the coal-black concrete echoed through the empty space. Despite a thousand trips through the lobby, Austin still couldn’t help but look up at the crystal-clear ceiling. There was no glare on the transparent roof, and through it the glimmer of ten-thousand stars shone as clearly as being out under the naked sky.
The material only looked like glass. Austin, having been one of the few attendees allowed to witness its creation, could attest to that. It was actually a material called Grak. The only characteristic Grak shared with typical glass was transparency, and Grak was better at that too.
Grak was a graphene-infused, kinetically responsive, carbon crystalline structure assembled at a molecular level by nanites. In layman’s terms, it was what bulletproof glass dreamed of being.
On the day it was built Austin had glimpsed behind the curtain into the larger game his father was playing.
Moving through the lobby now and feeling nostalgic, Austin recalled its creation.
On that day, more than five years earlier, his father had asked him to come out to the lab construction site to watch the demonstration of a new tech. The steel and concrete building was already complete, excepting the atrium wall and roof. The gap had reminded him of a Rubik’s cube that was missing a square in the middle of one edge.
Arriving a bit early, Austin had puzzled over tiny black circles in the concrete wall cross-sections. They were only in of to the two exterior walls that bordered the missing atrium wall, as well as in a 9” wide strip of foundation that ran between them. They’d been completely ubiquitous, not a single square inch in that band wasn’t saturated with them.
Picking at one first with his finger, and then with his pocketknife, he managed to chip off a few flakes of concrete but none of the black.
This was how his father had found Austin when he and Pete arrived at the head of a uniquely Bendik motorcade.
Behind them a crew of workers followed in a lifted and extended panel van with all-terrain tires–a van clearly designed to go just about anywhere. Next were two tanker trucks, each equally fitted with elaborate aftermarket suspension on both cab and trailer.
Each trailer was visibly two modular pieces. One, the cradle, was a hexagonal framework, open on top, resting on four rear and two front wheels, each with a fixed hub that housed power units to drive the tires independently. Two, the tank, was bright silver on the top two-thirds and matte black below with a pair of connection taps centered on either side.
Bringing up the rear, sporting a knowing smile, and driving the high-tech child of an armored truck and a luxury RV, was Olli.
Bendik, grinning and with a warm hug, was the first to greet his son. Behind him was the enigmatic Pete with his clever eyes, always a bit wider or narrower than normal, and rock-steady presence.
Pete’s full name was Peter Yowling, and he was for Bendik Texier what Pepper Pots was
for Tony Stark, excluding the superhero suits and sexual tension.
Pete was a tall, slender, tan-skinned Native American man. He was fiercely efficient and had a voracious mind that seemed to suck in and retain information like nobody Austin had ever known.
For some reason Austin did not understand, Pete also had his father’s absolute trust. The man never seemed to be far away, and by all appearances Pete had no family or life of his own outside of his attachment to Bendik.
Olli joined them last, refused his handshake, and pulled Austin into a bearhug that nearly cracked vertebrae.
As the four of them talked, a short, grey-haired man with a tribal neck tattoo barked orders, heavy with New Englander A’s and R’s, to the work crew, directing the set up. The guy cursed like he held stock options in the business of foul language and was doing his damnedest to pump up its price.
In no time, his crew unwound a wrist-thick hose from each truck, pulling it to the back of the atrium before doubling it back on itself and leaving the connection coupling just inside the straight-cut, 9-inch depression where the security door would go.
Then, working in teams of two, they swiftly pulled long sections of smooth silver pipe from their van and assembled them into a single tube that stretched across the lobby gap.
The hoses were connected to manifolds in the center section, then the whole thing was fastidiously double checked by the pint-sized crew leader before he called, “Yar good to go Bendik sir.” Then held a raised hand with a lifted brow, waiting, checking to make sure there was nothing else to do.
“Thanks, Clint.” Bendik gave him a thumb’s up, went directly to the tube, and pressing his finger onto a panel on the tube’s side, activated the mechanism.
Austin had wondered on this, as it seemed an easily defeated security lock, until he’d noticed his father holding a small bit of cotton between finger and thumb afterward. The machine was secured with a genetic lock.
Commonly called a blood lock, in addition to testing genetic markers, it also checked blood pressure and used hormone pre-screening to ensure samples were taken directly from the authorized individual’s body and they were not under duress. There was nothing more secure.
