Virtual Immortality

by Matthew S. Cox

  “They’re not on its map of facility structures.”

  “I really don’t give a god damn why it’s shooting at me, just make it stop!” Eldon sounded more angry than scared.

  The hallway blurred around him as he followed the map to the control node for the turret. The room had its own security routine, separate from the rest of the network that was offline.

  He sweated it more than he thought he would, finding a rush of entertainment at it being just at the limit of his ability. It took a few tries for the system to accept his spoofed input, and the shiny steel doors snapped open with a squeaking hiss. He stepped through into the node, thrilled by the challenge, but disappointed that he could not face this network in its prime.

  The control node looked like a turret station from a military ship. A pair of joysticks jutted up from a desk in front of view panels where targeting and ranging information overlaid the real world. Eldon’s silhouette outlined in blinking red as the turret melted deeper and deeper into the large stack of shipping containers. Shrapnel littered the area from Eldon playing duck hunt with an unending stream of security bots emerging through a small hatch on the underside of a large drop building just behind the turret.

  A humanoid apparition of silver coalesced in midair just to Joey’s left. A featureless upside-down raindrop of mercury formed a head mounted to a polygonal torso. Its arms and legs stretched into long inflexible tendrils that tapered to points in the most basic approximation of the human form.

  “You must be the turret control program.” The dark cowboy flipped his guns out of his holsters and spun them over his finger. “We need to talk.”

  It leapt at him in an attempt to spear him with one of its pointy arms. The razor sharp tip passed millimeters from Joey’s chest as he disappeared and reappeared on the other side of the room. It whirled to face him just as he fired.

  His bullets, tiny smoking skulls, wailed with a keening cry as they flew. Of the lot, only one defeated the construct’s erratic dodging motions, shattering a gouge out of its side and sending thousands of silver toothpicks spinning into the air in slow motion. Cyan glow highlighted the jagged surface of the damage, a wireframe superimposed over frozen mercury.

  Floating up, it zoomed in an arc and crashed to the ground, spearing all four limbs into the floor. The dark cowboy threw his head back, floating to the right. No sooner had he cleared the ground than four silver spires lanced upwards, falling just short of piercing him.

  The aged gunslinger roared, firing as he sailed through the air, a barrage that continued until he landed. Shot after shot smashed into the silver construct. The process threads it had opened to attack him provided an easy route to exploit; cyberspace represented it by the creature being stuck to the ground and unable to evade. It shattered into thousands of chrome chunks, scattering across the black floor. Within seconds, the squealing pieces melted into the ground. The larger fragments lost their shiny coating and degraded into ebon blocks wrapped in a glowing cyan grid.

  With the construct gone, it became a simple matter to shut down the turret and the security bots. The newfound calm let Joey scan the network more thoroughly, but there was so much damage, he had no access to anything of interest. With nothing else to do, he logged out.

  Joey squirmed, finding himself wedged against the ground. It took some doing for him to wriggle his way out, and he blinked at a field of destroyed security bots when he emerged. “Looks like you had fun.”

  The gold visor blocked Eldon’s grin. “Just like the training range.”

  The group crossed the area to the nearest drop building; heading for the one with ‘Security Station’ stenciled across the outside in black letters. It had no windows or other markings.

  Drop buildings were normally used off-Earth, designed to allow for quick setup of a starter outpost in a hazardous environment. Spring-loaded struts similar to the landing pads of spacecraft, held them four feet off the ground, and their hull was even thicker than the armor of a military starship.

  Joey circled to a set of portable stairs that led up to a hatch. The steps, as well as the landing at the top, bristled with thousands of upward pointing tines meant to grab the soles of heavy boots, like walking on a sea of table forks. The code locked door still appeared to have power. Joey had the console open and hanging off the wall on its wires within minutes. A hiss of inrushing air drew a wisp of smoke from the shorted circuit into the building as the door slid open.

  Eldon nudged it open with his boot. “Sweet shit… poor bastard.”

  “What?” Joey tried to get a look.

  The sight that greeted them made even Katya gasp. A blackened corpse lay face down just inside the door, having rotted to the point where it no longer stank. The arms lacked hands and the stumps ended at uneven lengths of splintered bone. A waving pattern of sprayed blood streaked the walls behind it, and a pair of thick restraints remained about the corpse’s legs.

  Masaru appraised the scene. “Explosive restraints. Whoever ran this place was definitely not playing nice. That poor fool probably found a Nano knife and cut the cord between his wrists.”

  “Shit. Are those live?” Eldon glanced at the metal loops.

  “Clean ‘em off; Katya might want ‘em. She’s probably into that.” Joey’s laugh echoed down the corridor.

  She punched him in the side, hard enough to drain the humor from his stare.

  He rubbed the spot, wincing. “See that? Defensive. Means I’m right.”

  She hit him again, now shaking.

  Kenny moved between them.

  “Easy, lay off her a bit.” He turned to Katya. “You need to learn how to ignore him.”

  “Ignore who?” She smirked and turned away.

  “They may still be functional.” Masaru held them aloft by the connecting cable.

  The corpse’s ankles disintegrated at his tug, and he tossed the manacles to Eldon, who caught them as if dropping the device would have killed everyone.

  Masaru glanced deeper into the building. “They’ll only explode if you cut the cable or move past a trigger point.”

  Eldon moved with caution. “We have no idea how old the explosives are, even NE6 gets testy after a few years.”

  He tiptoed to the door and threw the restraint like a bolo off into the distance. He nodded at the lack of detonation before he stepped over the dead man and ventured down the hall. There was little of interest in a guard station save for a couple empty bunks. A small locker room had two smashed autoshowers and two large sinks. A search of the lockers found a single white jumpsuit that bore the logo of StarPoint Industries. Everyone exchanged looks.

  “We just walked into an off-the-books research station for the largest military contractor in the UCF.” Eldon gazed at the ceiling. “Dammit. Your guess is as good as mine what kind of nonsense is gonna wanna take a bite out of our asses here.”

  Kenny took that idea in the opposite direction. “Or we might find something worth millions.”

  “Assuming they left anything good behind and it won’t kill us to touch it.” Masaru chimed in.

  Katya fidgeted. “Let us do what we need for Joey and get the hell out of here.”

  Eldon shook his head. “Whatever they did here had to be something the UCF would not have liked. The only reason to do it all the way out here is to avoid scrutiny.”

  Joey held up a finger. “Or work on something too dangerous to do in city limits.”

  “That’s so much better,” grumbled Eldon.

  The next door led to a tiny room that resembled a holding area with four cells, with floors composed of metal tiles separated by rubber. One cell still held the faint smell of urine and sweat. Wall panels had controls to electrify the floor as well as vary the temperature within each chamber individually. Katya turned away, and slipped back into the hallway without a word.

  A few meters ahead in the hallway, a single door hid beneath a massive layer of fuming frost.

  Joey blinked. “Well okay, that’s prett
y fucked up.”

  Eldon eyed it with distrust. “I got a bad feelin’ about that. I would say we skip it, but you know how my luck works. Whatever we need is probably in there.”

  veryone paused, staring at the patch of ice glowing at the end of the tenebrous corridor. Fog formed a cloud at the base of the door; the surrounding metal shimmered with millions of tiny droplets. Eldon approached first, glancing at a handle encased in years of frozen condensation. He stomped his heel into the door several times, causing some of the ice to chunk off in large slabs. Skittering shards raced away in all directions along the floor. Realizing that would take forever, he melted through key spots with his vibro knife and a final few stomps knocked an immense slab to the ground with a perfect mold of the door on the underside.

  Knee-deep fog swirled around a white-walled lab on the other side of the door. An empty metal shelf on the left was between them and four lockers, open and empty. A few loose pieces of ammunition lay on the ground as well as a few trails of blood droplets. The fog diffused into the corridor, its apparent source a ruptured cryo-fluid tank at the back of the room. To the right, a heavy lift arm hung from the ceiling near a row of four cylindrical tubes. Three were empty while one held a three-foot tall chunk of frozen translucent material. Inside it, the flesh colored blur of a human form hung trapped in a twisted posture.

  Everyone moved closer to examine it, only able to make out the sole of a foot that appeared to have been kicking at the wall of the chamber when the liquid froze. A dark spot deeper in the substance hinted that the unlucky person wore the same exploding restraints.

  “Last time I checked, corporations didn’t have the authority to arrest people.” Eldon shook his head.

  “Since when do corporations obey laws?” Katya said with a chill in her voice.

  “In the UCF they do.”

  “You are naïve.” Katya folded her arms. “And we’re not in the UCF now.”

  Eldon flipped his visor through several scan modes to get a better approximation of the figure’s outline. “I think it’s a woman.”

  “I could have told you that from the shape of the foot,” said Masaru.

  “Think they kept her for fun? Perhaps a research project?” Katya squinted into the cloudy mass.

  Masaru’s eyebrows flattened. “Doubtful. Cryo-storage is too involved and expensive to use for a concubine, and StarPoint does not do biological or genetic work. It is more likely she is a spy, a traitor, or tried to steal something. Granted, it begs the question, why not just kill her?”

  Kenny touched the tank. “Is she alive?”

  Joey fiddled with the control system for a few minutes and worked on bypassing the authentication. “Looks like it, status is in the green.”

  “Whoa, wait a sec…” Masaru raised a hand. “We don’t know why she’s in there. That could be an assassin doll.”

  “Why would they freeze a doll?” Kenny made a face. “They’d just turn it off.”

  “Not if it had a living brain.” Masaru frowned.

  “Not a doll,” said Joey. “There’s life support monitoring.”

  Katya paced around the other end of the room. “It’s not right… corporations think they own people.”

  Joey paused, staring due to the uncharacteristic vulnerability in Katya’s voice. For some reason, he decided not to take advantage of the opportunity. “Come on, we can’t just leave her.” He hammered the terminal with a few kit viruses. “Besides, think of the gratitude sex.”

  “You are a pig.” Katya snapped at him. For a brief moment, she thought better of him, until he ruined it.

  Joey grinned, continuing to work through the security. “Oink.”

  “He may be crass but he’s right.” Eldon nodded.

  “What!” Katya blinked.

  “No, dammit, not about the sex… We can’t just leave her here. It just ain’t right to do that to a person, I don’t care who they are.”

  The console chimed and a pleasant female voice emanated from nowhere in particular. “Cryo Stasis system online, resuscitation process initiated. Please stand by.”

  The lift arm swung around, the large curved claw grip at the end the perfect size to grasp the cylinder of frozen material. Vibration shuddered through the entire room as it moved the plug of frozen gel into another chamber. When the arm retracted, a clear barrier rose out of the floor to surround it. Heavy machine noises came from below as a cloud of opacity spread through the substance like milk poured into water. Everyone stared mesmerized at the expanding whiteness until it engulfed the entire mass.

  Rattling in the floor waned and the sound of the machinery wound down. In the ceiling, the whine of a blower fan kicked on. The opacity turned out to be fog. Drawn into vent slits, it revealed the form of a nude young woman curled up on a metal disc and covered in little droplets.

  Thin and fair skinned, teal polish covered every nail. Her face looked too young for her body, and hand-shaped bruises circled both of her upper arms. Streaks of eyeliner ran down her cheeks as though she had been crying before being frozen. Canary blonde hair hung to her collarbones, with an inch of black at the ends; her eyelashes thick and dark from makeup. The explosive restraints linked her wrists together in front and another set secured her ankles.

  The display panel on the restraints had cracked, and the housing had tarnished around the seams.

  Kenny cringed. “Electronics are toasted. We’re gonna have to cut them off.”

  Masaru held up a hand. “Hold on, we don’t know how dangerous she is.”

  Joey tried to remove his duster coat, forgetting it was part of his armored vest. Katya gave him a surprised glance.

  The same ephemeral voice echoed from everywhere. “Cryo resuscitation process complete. Shutting down.”

  The shield sank into the ground. As soon as the seal broke, air entered the space and the shining disc flashed blurry with condensation. Everyone stared in silence, watching her chest move with her breaths until her eyes fluttered open. For a few seconds, only her eyes moved; shifting from one person to the next. She swallowed and went to sit up, discovering she was in restraints when she tried to brace her hand against the ground.

  Screaming, she thrashed against the binders. Kenny and Joey both reached to help her, but she scooted back against the wall. Her breath fogged in the air as she breathed in erratic staccato rasps, and the second realization, how cold it was, hit her.

  “Who are you?” She shivered, her voice a pathetic squeak. “What do you want? Why am I naked?”

  “We just found you frozen in cryo gel.” Masaru crouched down to examine the restraints. “It is standard procedure to be naked when frozen. Clothing can fuse with the skin during the process causing permanent scarring. I do not understand why these were not removed first.”

  She shied away from her reflection in Masaru’s visor, blushing. “I… don’t remember anything.”

  “This girl seems familiar.” Katya studied her deep green eyes. “I know I’ve seen her somewhere.”

  “There’s plenty of clothes in that HLM van.” Eldon pointed over his shoulder with his thumb.

  “What’s your name?” Kenny reached to help her up. “We are not here to hurt you.”

  She ventured a hesitant peek. “I… I don’t remember.” Her teeth chattered.

  “Let’s get you out of this cold.” Kenny went to pick her up, but she shrieked and scooted away.

  Masaru stood up. “Judging by the bruises and being upside down in the tank, I think they froze her in a hurry… probably when the fighting started. Chances are good that they did not follow proper procedure and she may have temporary or permanent amnesia.”

  Kenny pulled her off the metal plate and helped her to her feet. She wobbled in place as she tried to get a purchase on the slick ground, leaving smeared footprints in the condensation. Eldon looked off in a polite direction. Joey did not hide his checking her out.

  “I’d give you my coat but it’s not really a coat. It’s part of the armor.
” Kenny tugged at it to prove his point.

  “How can we get her out of those things?” Katya smirked.

  “Easy…” Eldon raised a hand. “We don’t know how stable they are.”

  “Unstable?” The girl still searched for a voice, still producing only a squeaky whisper.

  No one wanted to tell her that she had four small bombs locked onto her.

  She looked at the vibroknife on Eldon’s belt. “Hey, that’ll cut through these. Please…” She made doe-eyes at him that made even Joey feel guilty. “If you let me out, I’ll do anything you want.”

  “Oh, come on. What are you, sixteen?” Kenny couldn’t look at her.

  “Nineteen.” She picked at her hair. “I’ll be twenty in a few months…” Her eyes took a distant look for a moment. “I think I remember my birthday being August 21.”

  “Actually…” Joey raised a finger over his shoulder as he studied the console. “She’s been a snow globe for about 7 years if the system log is accurate, so if she went in at nineteen, she’s technically twenty six.”

  “What?” She spun to face him so fast she almost fell. “Seven… years?”

  “How does a nineteen year old wind up a prisoner in a military research facility?” Joey disconnected his deck from the console.

  “Probably kidnapped from the city to be experimented on.” Katya stared at the floor.

  “No.” Eldon shook his head. “StarPoint doesn’t do that kind of thing; they make military vehicles, they’d have no need of this.”

  “Don’t tell me you buy into all that conspiracy theory stuff?” Kenny glanced at Katya.

  She let her Russian accent go unrestrained. “I have seen what they can do.”

  “I can probably get those off. Let me have a look.” Kenny held out his hand to her.

  She remained still as he examined the metal around her wrist. She offered a weak smile once she realized he was not just trying to peek.

  “Standard steel. The screws are recessed, but I think I have a driver for them in the truck.”

  Katya looked up with sudden remembrance. “Amber? Is your name Amber?”