Children of Dawn

by B. C. Johnson

  Despite her repulsiveness and at the same time, thankfulness she could not taste this food, she noticed that the general tension level in the diner was quite low. This was a strictly civilian diner, the patrons all employed in the local industrial plants where they were tasked to do manual labor and work around heavy machinery all day to keep their government issued apartments from being taken away from them. Civilians didn’t work for a paycheck, everything they needed was provided for them by the Tribunal, and most were happy about it. After decades of war and foraging for just a single thing to eat or a protective shelter to sleep under, hundreds of people were more than happy to have everything handed to them. To some, it was like having early retirement. All they needed to do was show up at their designated job site by a certain time, always have their identification on them, and stay out of specified citizen zones and nobody bothered them. Anna had spent so long trailing those who were unhappy in their civilian roles, she failed to see the happy, genuinely thankful faces. She wondered - why would anyone want to cause harm to such a loving and giving government?

  She quickly redirected her thought patterns, reaffirming herself back into her character. She couldn’t think like that if she was to be convincing as a defector. She was supposed to be ready to join these “Regulators”, she needed to appear wary of the Tribunal, something that inherently went against every circuit in her body.

  It wasn’t long before two figures entered the diner and looked not a bit as happy as the rest of the workers around. Anna checked her internal clock, and realized these individuals were who she was meant to meet. The figures were draped in long work coats, their collars raised to hide half their faces. The man in front looked remarkably young, probably in his early twenties. He had short curly blonde hair, soft features, and the most stunningly emerald eyes. He spotted Anna, pointing at her and looking at his comrade. The other man looked towards Anna and almost cut her with his stare. He was much older and darker, with long black hair, a jutting jaw, and a crooked nose. It was as if his face had been beaten and healed so many times it had forgotten its original shape. His dark brown eyes pierced through Anna with almost a familiar sense. The memory lingered like a ghost on the outskirts of her databanks, barely visible, but she was sure it was there. She had seen this man before, but now in any of her investigations. How could she have memories of a time before she was in operation? Anna was so wrapped up in her pursuit to retrieve the proper memory file, that she didn’t even realize the two men had joined her at her table until they were right in front of her. “Anna Maquina?” The blonde man inquired.

  Anna was immediately pulled to focus. “Yes.” She said plainly.

  “My name is Roland Deverot. This is my associate Marcus. We represent an organization that is interested in recruiting you to our cause.”

  Anna feigned interest. Marcus looked around, like he was expecting others to pounce on them at any moment. “That’s an interesting last name…” He commented.

  Anna smiled. “My parent’s said our family were once from a land across the ocean. Spleen? Spene? Something like that.” She giggled. “You’re awfully untrusting.” She added.

  “Used to be a cop…” Marcus grumbled, “Comes with the territory.”

  Anna’s memory flashed again. Police uniforms, a Sergeant rank insignia on Marcus’ arm. The edges of her vision foggy and words mumbled. Where was she remembering all this from?

  Roland cleared his throat awkwardly as Anna’s face was vacant again. “We understand you most recently finished school and applied for your citizenship… is that correct?” He questioned garnering Anna’s attention.

  Anna knew how to play this card. “I thought citizenship applications were confidential?” She asked, faking she didn’t already know they probably had a contact in the applicator office. No use prying further, whoever the contact was, they were small fish.

  “We know a lot of things others aren’t privy to Ms. Maquina.” Roland retorted.

  This guy was brave, putting a lot of faith in Anna that she wouldn’t scream traitor and have them both hauled off. Then again, to their knowledge, Anna had contacted them. She decided to relax, let the words leave her mouth without going through her many censorship programs. “Yes well that’s exactly the kind of organization I was looking for. Not these small time activist groups, the real power fighters.”

  Roland looked to Marcus beside him, who never looked away from Anna. Marcus reminded her of a trained dog, attentive, focused, ready to attack the second Roland gave the word. Roland stared back at her. “Well, prove you are useful and we can definitely use another hand.”

  “What do you want me to do?” Anna asked coyly, almost seductively.

  Roland stood and Marcus followed. The blonde haired man reached for Anna’s hand and smiled. “First, you need to understand our mission. It’s one thing to fight against something you disagree with, its quite another to see who you’re fighting for.”

  It was very odd how comfortable Roland walked the streets. They were deep into the civilian sector now, Roland giving Anna an impromptu tour while explaining the Regulator’s goals. He moved like a politician would walk among their constituents, no fear on his face of police or even being identified as an enemy of the Tribunal. Every civilian who passed them smiled and shook his hand. He was a god amongst insects. “You see, the people agree with what we’re doing…” Roland stated as he shook another person’s hand.

  Anna chose to stay quiet during the tour, appearing interested was better than trying to debate. Roland brought them into a housing building, walking along the hallways. Anna saw apartments built for two people housing families of four to five, and children running rampant about the hallways. The wallpaper was coming off and Anna’s motion trackers could see various kinds of insects and rodents running within the walls. Anna had thought the mutants on the outskirts had it rough…

  “This is but one of hundreds of buildings like this.” Roland said, noticing Anna’s face. “But because these people are not healthy enough to enlist, or smart enough to graduate finishing school, they are forced into this existence. The worst part is, they think living in these conditions is a blessing. They don’t even know that they’re being cheated.”

  They continued to an interior courtyard of the building, that had been turned into an outside market. The commotion was almost too much to bear. Anna saw people trading bottle caps from old sodas for extra food rations, light bulbs, toilet paper, almost everything that was controlled by the Tribunal’s distribution system was readily available by over a hundred vendors. This entire operation was illegal. Anna looked to Roland for explanation. “Things happen, sometimes rations go bad, someone gets sick, everyday life’s little dilemmas. The Tribunal denies the basic freedom to earn a paycheck, so the civilians have to find their own way to care for their families.”

  The three of them left the “market” and started walking down another street. Roland let Anna absorb everything she had seen. “It is normal to feel the way you do. I’m sure growing up with citizen parents lead you to believe the Tribunal was a generous and loving government.”

  Anna’s “parents” were obviously a part of her fake identity. She stayed silent as Roland continued. “The Regulators don’t want anarchy, we want justice. We are striving to get the Tribunal to listen to the plights of the civilian work force. But they won’t listen unless we have something to hold over their heads. That is why we need you.”

  “What do I need to do?” Anna asked bluntly. Her quickness to volunteer came as a surprise even to her, she couldn’t decide if it was out of character or because of what she had recently seen. Maybe it was a little of both.

  Roland smiled and looked to Marcus, who turned to guard their backs as Roland came close. “We have a job for you. We need you to infiltrate the Tribunal intelligence building. We need you to find something, anything that might get the Tribunal to listen to us. Get us something that will force them to put down their guns, and pick up their pens.” />
  Anna’s intel had been wrong. The Regulators didn’t want her to infiltrate some office building, they wanted her to break into one of the most secure facilities in the city. Data mining a top secret information hub like the Tribunal intelligence building was an act of suicide. Level three classified material was stored on their servers, data that was kept even out of Android’s reach. She couldn’t decipher whether Roland knew exactly how much he was asking. Anna was having difficulty deciding what was the right thing to do, continue following her mission parameters or keep following Tribunal law. If she did this, she would certainly be going against everything her logic and threat analyzers were telling her. Could she bring herself to betray the Tribunal?

  Chapter 5

  Access Log

  File number 137490

  Android Serial number: 2338

  Codename: Anna

  28 September 2313

  1000 hrs.

  Anna’s long brown hair bounced freely against her back as she confidently strode towards the Tribunal Intelligence building. She was dressed in common female business attire, her clothes hiding the skin tight stealth uniform she commonly wore on her investigations. The mission Roland had given her was a simple one. Use a search virus program he had given her to access the vast range and numerous levels of the extranet and Tribunal servers from its source and find something that the government was keeping under wraps. There would be a meeting to discuss her findings, but other than that she was left on her own.

  Anna’s initial misgivings over breaking into the building had been swept away by her logic algorithms. In her current mission parameters, she had deemed it more important to gain the Regulator’s trust than to follow Tribunal law. The Chairman must have known something like this would happen, why else would he have assigned this mission personally? He had said himself that this operation was something unlike anything any Android had done before. She was going to have to break a few rules in order to complete her undercover objectives. This sneaking into the building sounded like a simple in-and-out job to Anna, which put her back into an element she was comfortable with. She walked with almost a spring in her step, finally done with playing her “role” and back to something she was programmed to do. It was almost going to be fun.

  She sent a flirty wink to the young officers checking identification badges, slipping through security with ease because of it. She entered the elevator and rose to one of the upper floors. She knew M.A.D.R.E would be tracking her, knew she probably was even aware of what Anna planned to do, but it was all part of playing the role of the double-agent the Chairman had wanted her to be. However the danger wasn’t with the higher echelons like M.A.D.R.E or the Chairman, or even the Tribunal, it was with those in the building.

  Androids performed in-an-out operations as one of their many investigative tactics. If word reached them of possible corruption inside businesses, even government agencies, they would be expected to investigate. The Tribunal and the Androids were incorruptible, but civilian and citizen alike could always be easily tempted. They were human after all. The point of operations such as this was always to sneak in and access the company’s files with their built in incursion software. If there was nothing implicating, then the investigation was done, if there was, an instant alarm was sent to the Tribunal for prosecution. This time; however, Anna would be searching through Tribunal files, not some company or government contractor.

  Anna reached an office level with cubicles as far as she could see. She skillfully moved through the small maze of corridors until she had found an open computer port. She sat quietly, looking about to see if she had aroused any suspicion. When she was satisfied that she was in the clear, she pulled the small data stick Roland had given her from her pocket.

  At this point Anna found herself conflicted. She had her own incursion software, she could search the extranet herself. She thought through such action. The Tribunal had plenty of programs that the public knew nothing of, but she wouldn’t be able to find anything that would scare them into negotiations with the Regulators. What did Roland expect her to find? Then again, if the Tribunal was hiding something, her incursion software wouldn’t have access to level three security files. But files like that were mostly on the history of Arcadia, the identities of the Tribunal members, and other security information. Could the Tribunal also be hiding operational files on that level? She stared at the small stick in her hand for several minutes as her programming looped around itself trying to judge the correct course of action. Again she found herself trying to justify such actions based on her mission parameters. Would she be committing treason if she used Roland’s incursion software instead of her own? Finally, she snapped out of her daze, sighed briefly, and stuck the drive into the terminal.

  The screen practically exploded with color as the virus written onto the drive stick weaseled its way into the vast databases of the extranet. Windows and lists of data streamed across the screen and then disappeared as the program sifted its way through thousands of files in seconds. Anna’s processors computed the images and data files as they shot past the screen, working hundreds of times faster than a normal human brain. Files on the founding days of the Tribunal, the acquisition of the civilian and citizen populous, even the Chairman’s personal journal, all snippets of information the virus looked at and decided weren’t important to the Regulator’s cause. Finally the chaos stopped with one picture and a window of notes. Anna scanned the information and her circuit boards almost flipped.

  What was on the screen was the location and condition of a Tribunal base… hundreds of miles from Arcadia. Anna pulled the tip of one of her fingers back, hinging it open to reveal a small Ethernet cord. She pulled on it, tugging it free and unwinding it until she could plug it into the terminal. She instantly downloaded the schematics and data to this base into her system’s memory. She didn’t have time to review it as she noticed three men in suits heading towards her cubicle. The virus’ incursion must have tripped an alarm. Anna replaced the chord and unhinged her finger, pulling the stick from the terminal. As she turned to leave, she ran straight into the lead suited man. He eyed her scruffily, looking into the cubicle that was vacant of any personal effects. He looked back at her and grimaced. “Do you work on this level?”

  She was caught, no use trying to talk her way out. Anna uppercut the man’s chin, sending him reeling back into the other two. As she turned to sprint down another aisle between the cubicles, she could hear the guards yelling for backup. As her gears accelerated her running, she designated the humans around her into various shades of threat, helping her see the guards coming out of offices and corridors about her. She neared the end of the aisle, a guard stepping out of cover directly in front of her, his pistol raised. “Hold it right there beautiful!” He said overconfidently.

  In one fluid movement, Anna reached for the pistol, flipped the slide release, slid the weapon apart, and kneed the bewildered guard in the stomach. The man fell to the floor as Anna turned, her back to the window. Guards surrounded her, their weapons drawn. She sighed, knowing what her next step was going to take. As the guard she had uppercutted earlier drew his pistol down on her, Anna smirked at him, slightly shaking her head. Then… she jumped.

  The window’s glass shards twinkled around her. Her body almost floating as it flew through the open air. As gravity took effect, she pirouetted so her feet would land first, and plummeted twelve stories to the lower roof. She landed perfectly, her inner shock absorption cushioning her joints, letting her survive a landing that would have killed a normal human.

  Anna waited there for a few moments, letting her interior gears and hydraulics readjust and status update after the landing, but she wasn’t to wait for long. Shots rang out over the still morning, the guards firing from the broken window high above. One round hit Anna in the midsection. No more time to wait. Anna shot off like a bullet. She sprinted across the rooftop and leaped from the edge, over the fence, to the street below. She looked back up at the sh
attered window as the guards clambered over each other to try and get to her. She allowed herself a small smile.

  Anna darted into a nearby alleyway and expertly climbed her way to the safety of the rooftops. As the commotion of her break out caused a rush of excitement and noise, a few blocks over Anna sat by a vent and brought up the files she had extracted. She reviewed them in her optics, satisfied that this would win over Roland.

  She allowed herself a moment to contemplate on what she had just done. As she looked back at the building she had burst out of, she couldn’t help but wonder if she had just committed a treasonous act. Surely M.A.D.R.E was aware of her presence there, but the software used was not something that the computer system would have expected. She looked back at the data stick Roland had given her and sighed. She compartmentalized the data into a cryptic message and sent it to her contact. There was no turning back now; she had a mission to finish.

  Little did Anna realize that she had stumbled onto something that was about to change her beloved city forever.

  Access Log

  File number 137491

  Android Serial number: 2176

  Codename: Jenna

  28 September 2313

  1130 hrs.

  Chairman Fairchild’s cigarette smoke wafted through his office like a seductive dancer. He stared off for a few minutes, as older men tend to do, almost as if he was reliving all the decisions he had made through his life. Weighing them against the one he was about to make. Jenna leaned forward and spoke. “Mr. Chairman?”

  Fairchild snapped back to reality, looking back at Jenna and Aaron, both standing at rigid attention in front of his desk. He readjusted his focus. “Right, where is she now?”

  “Enroute to her meeting with the leaders, Sir.” Aaron commented.