But first, she had to escape, and the only card up her sleeve was her weird enhancement. When she had used focused attention before, the nanobots had responded, somehow enhancing her physically, but it had been organic. Maybe she could control them more directly.
The hover screen showed her percent of hydration. The higher the number, the more strong and clear she felt. Sixty… Sixty-eight. The hovering digital display read the increasing numbers.
She didn’t have long. Her aunt busied herself checking her computer logs.
This was the moment.
She put all her force into her right wrist. She needed to imagine something strong, something big. She felt warmth pooling in the wrist.
Her aunt turned and stared at her with an M-shaped frown line between her brows, then turned back to her hover screen. Ionia’s breathing caught, and she stopped moving. Did she know? How? Damn. Triple damn.
“How are you doing that? Are you consciously controlling them?” Her narrowed eyes and tight shoulders indicated her concern. “I think you’re hydrated enough.”
She returned to Ionia, this time with an old-fashioned metallic needle in her hand that contained some evil-looking goo.
Now or never.
Ionia yanked her arm free of the bonds and slammed it into Sera’s hand. The hypodermic flew and clattered against the cement flooring.
Ionia worked on her other bindings, but her fingers felt like fat sausages, too big to do any detailed work. If Sera got the needle, Ionia was done. She only had time for one move. She slammed her too-big hand down hard on the back of Sera’s neck.
Sera fell to the ground, stunned. Ionia worked on her other hand restraint, which finally popped opened, then leaned forward to get her ankles.
Needle in hand, Sera rose, any look of humor or pity gone. Only violence was left on her screwed up face. She raised the needle, aiming at the fleshy part of Ionia’s thigh. Ionia grabbed her hand and fought to take it. But only sixty-eight percent hydration wasn’t enough to empower her muscles. Her arms quivered and loosened. Sera brought the needle down.
Ionia’s only thought was to avoid the needle. To stop it from penetrating her skin. With a metal sounding tink, the needle slid off, hitting the table instead of the flesh of her leg.
“Wait. What? I know I hit a vein.”
Ionia wasted no time. She didn’t think as she snatched the needle and jammed it into Sera’s neck and depressed the button releasing the drug.
Her aunt’s eyelids flickered, and her legs folded. Sera slid to the floor. “What are you?” she whispered before she fell into unconsciousness.
Chapter Sixteen
The emotional storm in his brain calmed slightly with the simple movement of the transport. He was programmed to respond to human stimuli. Infants enjoyed rocking, so adult humans found repeated rocking movements soothing. Even though he didn’t share their biochemistry, the movement helped. Finally, one piece of programming that he didn’t want to violently remove.
The bazaar rolled by slowly, and no one noted his transport in the bustle of humans and traffic. The afternoon sun warmed the booths but not as heated as it had been the last two days. It would have been a good day to explore the marketplaces. Ionia would have liked that.
And there it was. The return of the pain. Doubled for being surpassed. He had to stop the flow from his memory circuit, or he would be forced to deactivate and return himself to CONUS for a brain wipe
There had to be something that could break the chain.
Ionia had given him freedom. She had wanted him to have a life. He should honor her wishes and attempt to move forward.
He would leave this place.
Go as far away from ND as this transport could travel. Even leave the territory entirely. If he could find a shielded containment, he would go to CONUS. He could find others of his kind. According to reports, droids were accepted as citizens.
He clicked controls back to manual and aimed at the East coast of the continent. Leaving by water would be infinitely easier, especially if he powered down and used shielding.
This course of action seemed to be in alignment with his emotional chip as well. It was a good path. Unknown, but full of possibilities. Ionia would like it. But more importantly, he liked it. With one final look out the window, he opened the transport’s engines to full throttle.
***
Ionia’s legs and arms were again useless attachments. Apparently, being only sixty-eight percent rehydrated meant almost incapacitated and mostly crippled. She had no idea what had been in that hypo or how long Sera would be out, so she had to move. But forcing the needle into her aunt seemed to have drained what little energy she had. She tried to crawl but was as weak and useless as a newborn baby penguin.
Her only option was to scream. Even though she knew the lab was deep under her aunt’s house, and she didn’t know if Uncle Baran approved of her activities. Maybe her mom had returned and would hear something. It was her only hope.
“Help!” She tried to make any noise she could, grabbing at the table, trying to knock something off. Minutes ticked by, or was it hours? She had no way of gauging time.
There had to be a way out. Maybe something her aunt hadn’t thought to lock down. If only she could send a wave or maybe just…use the comm.
If the house system would still recognize her, she had a shot. “Cortex time,” she shouted.
“Eighteen hundred hours forty-seven minutes.”
Hell. Yes.
The sound of the calm auto-voice from the house sent a warm feeling over her soul. Maybe, just maybe, she might live.
“Open coms to living area.”
There was no way she could climb the ladder up to the surface. She needed help. Her mom. Maybe even Uncle Baran or one of the girls… Someone had to be there.
“Access denied. Authorization code.”
Shit on a cracker.
Some feeling returned to her arms, and she pulled herself upright and gasped. It was as if the pain of falling from the table combined with the trip and the fight with Chirag hit her all at once.
Her bloated body seemed to pull her to the floor, but she pushed up again and started to crawl. Every movement sent spikes of pain through what felt like every cell of her body. What she wouldn’t give now for a bit of the numb to return. No, that was fool’s thinking. Thinking like that would keep her in a box for the rest of her natural life. She needed to channel her inner bad ass. She needed to be like her mom. Her mom would never just lie down and wait for Aunt Sera to wake. She’d do something.
First, she thought about trying other sounds that may travel along the metal of the stairs up to the main house, maybe using one of the chairs and knocking metal on metal, but the sound proofing put that low on the list of things to try. What else could trigger the attention of the house or even someone on the street? Go with the obvious.
“Contact local enforcement.”
“Access denied. Authorization code.”
What the crap? Her aunt was a paranoid bitch. There had to be something else. Something her woozy head couldn’t think of.
Only pain and fear warred for territory in her mind. A tight knot of hate in her stomach made her want to crush her aunt’s head as she lay there helpless.
Ionia’s thoughts scrambled. Her breath became more shallow. She had to stop the panic. She had to find her sanguine oasis that Zee had shown her that even when her throat closed. Even when in the worst situation, she could remain centered, calm, in control.
She drew in a breath. There. She settled.
There had to be something. The day she’d been down here touring the facility, Sera had been worried about drawing too much power from the grid.
And now Ionia had an idea. “Turn on lights one hundred percent. Turn on power to surgical equipment.”
The lights flared higher, but the stupid disembodied voice said “Specifics needed” in a sorry-not-sorry tone.
“Laser scalpel. Magnifier.”
What the hell were the names of some of the other things that would draw power? “Environmental: add oxygen and...and magnify… everything.”
“More specific instruction needed.”
It was worse than talking to Den when he was first activated.
Tiny pokes of pain told her sensation was returning to the rest of her extremities. Her body throbbed like a giant knotted bruise, and her head felt like it was expanded to five times its normal size.
She pushed to rise again, forcing herself up to her elbows, then hands, then the knees. Everything seemed to be in the proper place.
She needed to escape, but maybe she had time to hydrate as well. A half dozen packets of the blood that was clearly meant for her hung by one of the far walls. Using the exam table as a crutch, she shuffled to them.
She silently thanked her mom again for all her basic medical training. She’d never actually used a rehydration bag, but she knew the basics. The bag was slightly bigger than her hand. She pressed the red thumb imprint and placed it against her skin.
Like entering a shower after walking in the desert, she could feel the cool sensation run in her veins. She felt more steady by the moment.
If the coms system didn’t understand her commands, it didn’t matter. She was going to turn on all of the equipment manually. She grabbed each piece of machinery. She knew quite a few medical tools, but some weren’t like anything she’d seen. Still, she cranked all to high, including a power-sucking hydrosaw.
The brownouts started, and she couldn’t help but smile. It would only be a matter of time. “Warning. Overload. Danger.”
Damn. “Which item is overheating?” she asked the comm.
“Plasma gun reaching critical. Shutting down all systems.”
“No. No. Wait. I’m shutting it down.” Her hands became a half dozen thumbs and toes, and she fumbled with the equipment.
“Please provide the override.”
“Screw you.”
“Incorrect. Shutting down.”
The lab was plunged into darkness. Her one shot to get out, and she’d screwed it up. How the hell was she going to save Den now? How the hell was she going to save herself?
***
Den maneuvered the transport onto the elevated highway and found the traffic had slowed in most of the major arteries that lead out of town. He determined to take a lesser known back road and exited to the ground level. The area he encountered was familiar, .25 kilometers from where he had followed Ionia and Zee out of the underground complex.
Zee. His attention cracked back in sharp relief to his former acquaintance. He still did not comprehend why Zee had abandoned Ionia. She was a droid like him and had given every appearance of being capable. He had entrusted what he valued most to her, and she had failed. What had happened before Chirag had come across Ionia? He had not considered gathering more information. At the time, it had not seemed pertinent. But now he was looking for a purpose and a meaning, and this was an unresolved loop. Had she abandoned Ionia? Had she turned her over? His anger simmered.
Then he listed the seventeen other possibilities, which included her being somehow incapacitated or detained. And if that had occurred, she could need his assistance.
He had no allegiance to this droid. Yet…he had formed a bond. Not like he had with Ionia, but something drew his circuits to review their time together.
He admired her actions when she had assisted other sentient droids. How she wanted to make a peaceable change in society. He reviewed how she had helped him and Ionia. And now she could be in disrepair or captured.
The caravan of vehicles started forward again at a good seventy-five kilometers per hour. But he would go no further.
Using the manual control, he pulled the transport out of the lane and parked it in a designated parking niche then typed in the instructions to return home.
No need in monopolizing Chirag’s transport while he was in the territory. He would search the area first and assure himself that she had not returned to her base. If she were indeed detained, he would assist Zee. He started a scan of the area to get his bearings.
A small shift in the air was his only warning. A chemical change that was subtle but deadly. He almost didn’t have time to react but threw himself onto the cobbled path.
Cleansing fire sizzled in a white flash destroying the interior. Some of the pedestrians noted the strangeness but kept moving. It was as if the occurrence had not happened. The transport appeared normal again and reattached to the automated highway, headed back to Chirag’s apartment.
The electrical explosion would have ended Den’s existence and fried his flesh. He would have ceased to exist. His defenses came online too late, but he couldn’t suppress his urge to fight. His body wound tight, and his hands shook with the unexpressed energy from almost being destroyed. The input made his process spin and sent a firestorm of sensation through his system.
Either the transport had malfunctioned, or Chirag had laid a trap. If it were Chirag, then he had mal intent for Den and may have been lying about everything. This even brought Dr. Hebbar into suspicion as his associate.
But it was not his nature to jump to conclusions. He would do the research. He followed the transport on its trek. He would confront Chirag first and discover if he knew more about Zee than he let on.
***
Well at least she wasn’t in a box, but this silent darkness made her feel like she was already in a grave. Time was moving, and her chance to escape was melting like a dusting of fresh-fallen snow. If flashing the lights didn’t work, maybe something more violent would.
If she could start a fire, from everything she knew about fire safety the doors, she hoped and prayed to all the gods of Asgard, they should be wired to open. She reached out blindly.
What was the layout of the lab? She had a vague memory of what was where. She reached out a blind hand. Suddenly the low backup lights flickered on.
Sera still lay in a twisted heap on the floor a few meters from the door. Her legs wrapped behind her in an awkward sprawl. She was going to be in some pain when she woke up. Served her right. She deserved worse. But the main goal right now was escape.
As if Sera could hear Ionia’s thoughts, she moaned.
If she woke up, all was lost. Ionia pulled herself to her feet using one of the exam tables laden with weird tentacles. She grabbed the laser scalpel and a sharp looking tool she didn’t know the name for and jammed them together until they broke open.
She touched two, but the electricity was dead. Crap she didn’t think of that. The blood loss and drugs still fogged her mind.
Another low moan sent a jolt of panic down Ionia’s backbone. She couldn’t lock up now. Before, she had used her weird nanobot power to ward off the needle. What if she could use it now? Maybe she could wedge the door open. The thought made her both excited and nauseous. No one would accept her now that she was a complete freak. She’d have to deal with that mess later.
First, survive. Second, deal with being a freak. Sounded like a solid plan.
At least her freakishness was proving helpful. She staggered to the door, teetering like a drunk. What would open the door? Something long and sharp and hard. Her hand tingled as a new flow of blood dumped down her arm. Her fingers seemed to melt and flow together into a long, sharp blade. She could still feel but in a muted way, as if her skin had become some kind of organic metal. Again, both freaky and awesome.
She shoved her new finger into the seam of the door and tried to leverage it open.
The door creaked, and her hand seemed to bend slightly but kept the tension strong. This was wild but not enough. The door was too thick, too reinforced, and she wasn’t sure how sturdy her hand would be, even in this metallic state.
Yet something moved, and she dug deeper.
Finally, the door quivered, and with a whoosh of air, it slid open. Ionia fell backward, sprawled on her back.
She looked up.
Ravi stood in the doorway, haloed by the ghostly
light of the backup generator. “Mom. You blew the circuits ag—” His voice caught as he surveyed the lab, the destruction, his mother lying as if dead, and Ionia with her new knife fingers.
He fumbled for words, eyebrows crunched. At last, he seemed to gather himself. “Mom? Are you okay?” Ravi rushed to his mother’s side, and she emitted another low moan. She still had not moved.
Obviously, the paralysis she had planned for Ionia. Which made Ionia burn again with the desire to kick her face in, but she held herself still. Ravi had a ton of power here. Her limbs were kitten weak, and she still had to make it to the surface. All her energy had been spent fighting his mother. Her only chance now was to be calm and rational and talk her way out.
“What’s wrong with her? What’s wrong with you?” His voice went up an octave as panic set in.
“Listen. You have to believe me. You know about your mom’s experiments, and you know she did something to me when I was a kid, to save me.”
He knelt and held his mom’s head in his lap. “Yeah, the nanobots,” he said, keeping his eyes on her face. “Should we call an ambulance?” He seemed suddenly younger. Not the smart-mouthed rebellious teen but a son of a mom who might be hurt.
But Ionia needed him to help her.
She needed him to be on her side.
“She’s fine, I think. Just dosed with some sedative she meant for me.”
Her hand tingled again, and the warmth drained. Her fingers melted back into their natural shape but maintained a slight metallic gleam. She felt drained as if all that fluid she’d absorbed had been flash frozen. Sitting up straight was even hard.
Ravi’s eyes were fully dilated, and his mouth was open. “You just—you just—”
“I know. I still can’t wrap my head around it either. Please, just help me. Your mom wanted to do experiments on me. She drained my blood. She told my mom I was dead. I just want to get out. Please.” Wow. That sounded crazy. The likelihood of him helping her dropped to zero percent. Her chest tightened, and her heart rate rocketed to what Den would call dangerous levels. She kept one eye on Ravi and his reaction.
Vagabond Souls: The Ionia Chronicles: Book 2 Page 27
