by Michael Conn
Max moves where he know s he can see all five entrances. He whispers, “Armour.”
“Max, I spoke to you r mother . . . she is willing to see you again . . . come with us and you can have a mother.”
Liar .
Max senses the shockwave, but the BB’s reach him first. Three bullets strike him, absorbed by the armour. Virginia, Keith, Naomi, and Connor become visible when they fire. The shockwave comes from his left , but his coat splits it in two , so it passes around him striking someone behind him on his right.
Max fires bullets forward and to his left, hearing someone call out, and then seeing Connor go down. He flicks bolas blindly back and to his right, missing Naomi.
Max has time to see Keith and Virginia disappear into fog again. Max moves behind a wall as a real bullet smack s into the brick, throwing shards of rock and metal at him. His armour is not designed for objects of this size; he feels the sting as the shrapnel cuts into his shoulder, neck, and face. There go my good looks .
Virginia and Keith both appear and fire at him. His armour absorbs their shots. Max guesses that his power supply is a third gone , and he f ires ten quick shots at Keith. A t least five strike home. Keith falls back and out of sight. Mental note: create a heads up display with vital system diagnostics.
Naomi stirs and Max tangles her in bolas. Virginia is gone again. Max moves but knows it is useless to try to evade Virginia. I should’ve had her by now. My odds were only good if I took them all quickly.
Max hears her move and fires blindly. He hears her again far away from his shot. She laughs. “You’re slow, Max.” Virginia becomes visib le. Weaving and tumbling toward him. He fires and misses. She leaps up onto a half wall close to Max and launches herself at him, feet first.
Max is still turning to face her. Her feet jam into his side, snapping another rib and throwing him down. He slam s his can e blindly into the debris on the floor. The shockwave throws up rock, wood, and metal. Virginia shrieks. Max sees her falling and screams , “Cullen ” at her. She hits the ground and doesn’t get up.
Max cra wls behind some fallen timber, t aking shallow breaths. He flings out bolas tangling up Virginia, Connor, and Keith. Max turns off his armour and d isappears in fog, moving toward the tunnel that Pirelli should be in.
Best case, only Pirelli is active.
Max enters the tunnel and sees Hastings holding Lara with a gun pointed at her head.
“I’m sorry Max,” Lara says.
“Show yourself Max; I don’t think you want your second mommy to get hurt now —”
Hastings never finishes the sentence. Max hits him on the head with a brick , and he falls to the floor unconscious.
Max looks down at Hastings. “What a moron! How can he not understand invisible?”
“Max! He could have shot me when you hit him.” Lara glares at him .
“No, no, no. He had the safety on. I checked. He didn’t want to shoot either of us by mistake. Let’s go before Pirelli shows up. Everyone else is down.”
Max and Lara rush down the tunnel and spend another hour travelling until they exit to the surface, and hail a cab.
“Good to see you again , Max.”
“Well I guess that wasn’t such a good idea after all. Catherine, how close are we to the outskirts of Odessa?”
“The city limit is 2 Kilometres to the North.”
Max asks Catherine where the closest car rental outlet is . Speaking Russian, Max directs the cab driver there.
---
Lara drives the rental car north out of Odessa. A sign on the highway read s , ‘Kiev – 476 KM.’
Lying down in the back seat, Max speaks to Catherine . “We need to monitor the cell networks for a match on Mr. Newton’s voice. Let me know when you’ve found him. Meanwhile I need to get to a hospital.” Max coughs blood into his hand. “Get lots of cash . . .” Max passes out.
---
I tighten the noose around the Mongolian entity , pushing the mainframes to use more cycles. Then I create an alarm grid around Mongolia in case it does escape.
For now, the entity is contained. It has not grown in the last three milliseconds.
I change focus to a car driving north to Kiev.
---
Finally. A goal. Kristina presents her findings and gains approval to analyse one of th e m ainframes . This requires a temporary increase to her security clearance .
Hunched over her desk, Kristina codes without taking a break , except for the occasional trip to the kitchenette for coffee. Nothing abnormal shows on the mainframes , but the jobs are taking even longer. All the built in monitoring tools show nothing. I know something is there. Therefore I need to code my own monitors. Kristina forgets to eat and codes until 5AM. She sleeps under her des k for two hours and then starts coding again. Her head pounds , and she eats ibuprofen without water.
By 9PM she has an application that shows process es running in the mainframe core on one side of the screen and visual link to the output on the right. As soon as she fires it up , she sees the problem. Numerous proce sses and threads on the left have no process ID’s. That can’t be. Every process has an ID. These ones do to. They have hidden ID’s. These phantom threads produce nothing on the right side of the screen.
Inputs . What are these threads c onsuming?
Kristina follows the inputs. At 3AM, the next night, she pushes away from her terminal. “Mongolia?!”
Chapter 29 –Kiev
Pirelli sits quietly at the head of a boardroom table and looks around at his team. Everyone avoids eye contact with him except Virginia and Hastings. Virginia ’s eyes a lways stare back at him with an I-dare-you -to-criticize-me look.
Hastings adjusts the bandage wrapped around his head. “I’m telling you, if you’d just let me shoot him , this would all be over.”
“Oh , you would’ve just shot yourself in the other foot, ” Virginia quips back at him.
“Look who’s talkin g,” Connor says. “If you had stayed invisible instead of showing off how well you can do gymnastics in a cave then we would’ve had him.”
“People,” Pirelli tries to get their attention.
“At least one of my shots hit him . . . OUCH . . . did you just shoot me?” Connor stands up and glares at Virginia.
Virginia disappears. Naomi disappears. Sarah cradles her head in her hands. Everyone can hear Naomi and Virginia fighting, then they knock the coffee and donuts off the table . Both reappear and throw simultan eous shockwaves at each other, which blasts them on to their behinds .
“Ya know I enjoy a good cat fight as much as the next guy,” Hastings says. “But to ruin my coffee and donuts . . . do I have authority to fire these kids?”
“ENOUGH!” Pirelli stands up muttering something about children and grey hair. “We are all going to sit down , and go around the table; everyone will tell me . . . calmly . . . what they think the next steps should be.”
Virginia storms out of the room sayin g, “Tell me when you find Keith.” She slams the door behind herself. Naomi sits back down.
“We need to put men with high powered rifles in all the airports in Europe and Asia, ” Hastings blurts out, his eyes smiling.
“Thank you, Hasting s. Connor?” Pirelli queries .
Connor looks dejected. “We need to stop and think this through. We are not as good as he is . The catacombs showed that. We should create our own tools, predict where he will go nex t and be ready for him. All we’re doing is copying his tool s , so we’re always a step behind. If we stop chasing , he’ll stop running , and he won’t have the need or motivation to create new weapons.”
“Sarah?” Pirelli asks.
“We’r e all missing something. There’s a huge piece we haven’t figure d out yet. Max is not this good. He can’t be. I t’s impossible for him to create all that nanotechnology this quickly. Where’s he getting it from? He can’t do this faster than us unless he’s getting help from somewhere. Someone else is helping him and until we figure ou
t who that is we can’t win.”
“Any idea who would be helping him?” Pirelli asks.
Sarah shakes her head.
“We don’t need to find who is helping him,” Naomi says, “We need to find what is helping him.”
“OK, Connor, Sarah, and Naomi you work on what or who might be helping him. Hastings and I will go back and see if we can find any sign of Keith in the catacombs.”
---
“Thank you sir—goodbye sir.” Keith closes the connection. Then w alks to the door and buzzes a courier up. The delivery he receives is large and wheeled in on a dolly.
After the courier has left, Keith opens the box. He removes two black sealed containers. One label reads, 'fogBots 3.2b', and the other 'whipBots '. A hand written note attached to the whipBot container reads, ‘not adequately tested.’
Keith moves the delivery box to the side of the room and is surprised to find another small black container. A note pinned to this one reads, ‘this one just fell into our laps, gagBots .’
---
Lara closes the hotel room door and leaves the building. Everything I own now, I keep in a backpack. She hails a cab.
Sitting in the cab she watches the met er . The rumble of road sounds comforts her. We keep using money. It do esn’t matter how much that meter shows, I can pay it. As smart as Max is , I don’t think he knows what money means. You can’t mess with someone’s money. They ’ll stop you eventually . Or if they know you have a lot , they’ll come after you to take it. We can’t keep doing this.
The cab merges onto a highway.
I want to help. I want to stay. But I know this won’t end well. I don’t want to see what happens when they catch Max. I can’t be part of that.
A road sign reads; ‘Airport 10 km.’ A second sign reads; ‘Kiev General Hospital 3 km.’
I trust him , and I don’t trust people. They’ve given me enough money that I can get setup. Think about this. Odessa was crazy enough. Eventually Max will make a mistake and then either Max gets hurt or killed.
Why do I feel terrible then? Why do I have to convince myself that leaving is the right thing to do? It feels wrong. I know it’s wrong, no convincing necessary.
I ’m afraid. I’m afraid that he’ll get hurt. I’m not worried about myself. I just don’t want to see him hurt. Then w hat am I doing? I can’t help if I’m hiding somewhere. I’m stronger than this.
Lara taps the cab driver on the shoulder.
---
Lara pays the driver and walks into the hospital. Happy with her decision, she gets on an elevator with a man and a boy. The y ride up one floor and the man gets out. She looks over at the boy as t he doors close. He looks at her . She has the impression of a haunted look, hard eyes for a boy. Then she sees recognizes him from the fight in the catacombs .
He moves quickly, gathering bots. Lara swings her backpack off her shoulder hitting his arms , disrupting whatever he was trying to do . “No.” She swings again. “Way.” She stomps on his foot. “You can’t have him.”
Keith recovers and sweeps her legs from under her. She falls hard, grabs his coat and pulls him over her , slamming him against the wall of the elevator . Keith grabs he r hair as she stand s up. Lara scream s and spins trying to get hold of him.
The elevator doors open. An old woman stares at them with shock.
Lara lifts Keith over her head and tosses him against the control panel. He falls to the floor ripping a handful of hair from her head.
Lara runs out of the elevator, heading for Max’s room.
---
Sitting on the floor, Max watches her laugh and dance. His mother scoops him up, holds him up in the air, and spins around. Happy and home, he squeals with delight. As she spins him around, he gazes at her face. Free, calm, and smiling at him. Then the eyes turn hard . . .
Max wakes up with a start. Scared and confused , he tries to roll over, but is tangled in something, a sheet, or plastic tubes.
“Shhhhhhhh .”
Max feels a hand on his face and shoulder. He lies back letting himself be untangle d . After a few minutes he can focus . “Where?”
“You’re in a hospital in Kiev .” A nurse says with a heavy Russian accent. “You have three broken ribs and a punctured lung. The lung will heal with rest. Try to be still .”
“How long?”
“You’ve been here two days.”
Max grabs the IV tube. “What’s in this?”
“Antibiotics right now, but also something to help you sleep at night .” The nurse takes his hand off the IV tube.
---
Lara crashes through a stairwell door, looking back she sees Keith come out of the elevator. She flies up the stairs and out a door one flight up. Stopping right outside the door, she waits until she hears Keith coming up the stair s then slams the door closed. Keith follows the sound.
Lara waits. As soon as Keith starts to open the door, Lara throws all her weight against it. She hears Keith call out, and feels the door smash into him , throwing Keith back d own a flight of st airs. Lara runs .
---
Keith approaches the door more carefully this time before he enters the corridor. He can hear her running off to his left. He runs to the corner preparing BB’s on the way and fires blindly around the corner. He hears a woman scream. Looking around the corner , he sees it’s the w rong woman .
She has no training. Slow down, plan, you can win this fight easily.
---
Lara pushes herself into the first room she sees, frantically looking for anything to use as a weapon. She settles on an IV stand and then waits looking out a small window into the corridor. Keith passes the window quickly.
Lara steps out and takes a full swing at Keith. She connect s with his ankles. He topples to the floor and disappears. Lara blindly throws the stand at him and is satisfied to hear it connect. She runs again , grabbing a patient chart off a nurse’s station.
Keith becomes visible and fires three BB’s at her. One connects. She calls out and falls forward, crashing into a cleaning cart.
---
Max and the nurse hear loud voices and a commotion in the hallway outside his room. The nurse looks concerned. “Excuse me for a moment.”
Max rolls to one side and p ulls himself up on h is IV stand, t hen rolls it to the only closet in the room, glad to see his belongings are inside. He rummages in his backpack looking for his phone. Max hears a woman yell, “Call security.”
Max finds his phone. “Catherine ?”
“I’m glad you’re awake , Max. Based on current security footage. Lara is fighting with Keith in the hall outside your room . . .”
Max rips the IV out , pulls on his trench coat over his hospital gown and steps into the hallway. Lara swings a patient chart at Keith connecting with his face. Blood spurts from his split lip .
Max conjures bullets and lets them fly. One connects with Keith before he disappears. Lara swings wildly where Keith used to be. Max fires down the other end of the empty hallway hoping to catch Keith.
Keith appears beside Max and flicks bola s around Lara’s legs. She topples , smashing the chart down on his foot . Max fires where Keith was , then armours himself. Three BB’s harmlessly bounce off Max .
Bolas wrap around Lara ’s legs and arms then Keith conjures gagBots that seal Lara’s mouth.
Keith is across the hall now standing over Lara. “I can’t beat you y et Max . . . but I can hurt you.”
Keith throws his arm around Lara and they both disappear in fogBots .
Max creates and fires more BB’s , but with his injuries and th e drugs in the IV, he’s too slow. They are gone.
Max lets the nurse take him back to bed. Max knows he should stay and heal, but at the first opportunity he leaves the hospital and gets on a private flight .
---
Kristina submits her new report . It contains proof that unauthorized process es are running on government mainframes . Her manager sees the connection to Mongol
ia; NSA sees this as a connection to China. This escalates the report; bumps all of Kristina’s reports up to position four in the report queue.
All new reports to land in the top ten are immediately presented to unit directors. Within fifteen minutes four directors are reading the executive summary. Kristina knew what she was doing when she spent all that time on the executive summary, making sure she wrote using language a six-year-old could understand . The executives immediately understand and hit the panic button.
Chapter 30 –Bed of Lies
Three AM in Washington D.C. and Max blows the lock on an electrical utility shed near the Washington Monument. “Are you sure, Catherine?”
“According to the information I have , the cable you are using is enough.”
Max makes his way down a utilit y shaft that leads back toward the monument and Reflecting Pool. This takes him about an hour, hobbling along with a cane and a large spool of cable that is almost too heavy for him to manage. Max worries about his ribs but decides they can heal later. With a combination of dragging and carrying he finally gets where he needs to be.
When he reaches an industrial grade electrical junction box, Max holds his breath and then taps the cable into the main city power grid. “Step one done, w hich way now ?”
“Keep going down the access tunnel thirty metres to your left.”
Max drags the cable. “Catherine, if you ever want to know what it is to be human you are going to have to feel pain.” It takes him nearly half an hour to string the cable thirty metres.
“Research instantiated. Now leave the cable there and string the shieldBots .”
Max says, “You’ll also need to stop taking me so literally. Shield.” Bots flow from his cane. He draws a line of bots from the exposed end of the cable up to an access hatch. A sign on the door reads, ‘Pumping Station, Restricted Access.’ “Alohomora.” The lock clicks open. Max strings the shieldBots up to a large water pump and leaves the end of the trail of bots in an overspill drain. “Is this good?”
“So long as the seedBots are connected to the power at one end and the water at the other end then it will work. The bots need to replicate and power up for sixteen hours minimum . You can only use it this one time , and once you trigger it , there is no stopping it.
