“Sir!” cried Danny over the open com, “The firewall is coming down. Check tracking on standard addresses.”
“Got it, Red!” shouted Proudstar.
The THOR unit made contact with CRAB unit 01.
The crash was deafening. THOR routed the CRAB with momentum, hurling the beast high in the air so it fell down, crashing onto its back, cannon buried in the mud. THOR leapt on the robot and seized a thick polymer leg in his jaws, biting through it at a junction and tossing it aside. The bot wailed mechanically and attempted to drive its remaining leg spikes into THOR’s chassis, but they glanced off the thick titanalum like pencils assaulting an anvil.
An explosion caught Danny’s eye. The little Rottweiler designated LOFN had been winged by a particle beam from CRAB unit 02. Everquist magnified. The Rottweiler’s back left leg was melted. The little borg wailed in horror. CRAB 02 fired again. The cyborg’s chest cavity exploded. CRAB 02 fired again, collapsing a halo of pink light glowing from inside the chassis. It fired again and again, pulverizing the metal body into unrecognizable slag.
A silver streak tore across the pumpkin field towards CRAB 02. Everquist could see the designation, SIEGFRIED CLASS FIREWALL ACCESS NIL.
That unit is hacking me out independently. Sweet!
CRAB 02 rotated swiftly and began firing on the SIEGFRIED unit. Danny clapped as he watched the Rottweiler dodge each stream of particle energy, twisting, sliding, contorting, all without losing the momentum of its charge. The borg dove onto the CRAB unit’s central chassis, wedging its body under the particle cannon’s turret. It buried its claws into the robot’s armor and pushed up, bending the turret and rendering it inoperable, raging and snarling with fury.
The hyper-agile CRAB unit spun its central sphere, knocking the SIEGFRIED unit into the mud. It pounced, snake-fast, driving a spiked leg between the cyborg’s shoulders and shoving it to the ground. The SIEGFRIED unit cried and wailed furiously, but the enormous robot was too powerful. It turned, keeping its prey lanced, and positioned its armored pincers behind the Rottweiler’s head.
Everquist panned out.
The THOR unit looked up, 600 meters away, having ripped all but three legs off CRAB unit 01. The huge canine cyborg wailed with anguish as he watched CRAB 02 slice off SIEGFRIED’S head and fling the Rottweiler’s destroyed chassis aside like so much discarded chattel.
Then CRAB 02 charged at THOR, scuttling to 100 kph over the mud, pincers forward like spikes. The remaining, scattered RIOT Dobermans charged as well. A sound of scissors slicing air filled the microphones and Danny had to turn away from his holoscreens.
A Few Minutes Earlier
The south facing guest room across the hall from William and Dorothy’s apartment was Tara’s least favorite room in the whole farmhouse. Dax had chosen to decorate it in a style he was calling traditional American rural, circa 1952. There was no comforting, 21st century holotech. Not even a single projector disguised as an antique light fixture, no hidden computer interface flush with the wall behind a holographic painting. Instead, an antique dresser made of southern Missouri pine dumpily made a center piece. Opposite, a queen brass bed with a pair of turd-like, knotty pine night stands. At the foot of the bed was a pine chest wrapped in pressed tin containing knitted blankets that smelled like a grandmother’s kiss.
Pine? And that isn’t even the worst of it, thought Tara.
The floor to ceiling, bantam rooster wallpaper was the worst of it. Paired with a braided, oval rug on which Tara sat cross legged with a holotab in her lap. The braided rug was so old it was made of cotton.
They talked as Dax intermittently fired out the window on the RIOT cyborgs, their conversation swinging wildly from one subject to the next as it was wont to do.
I detest antiques, love. This country kitchen Americana crap? Revolting. The only reasonable antiques are 20th century Swedish.
Dax squeezed off another round of particle energy and set the lightning gun on the hardwood floor to recharge off the solar relay on the wall.
He looked at her and pushed the thought, The Danish have some nice pieces from that era as well, his voice in Tara’s mind sounded as though they were enjoying lunch at a sidewalk cafe.
I prefer it when we talk like normal people.
The others cannot hear what I am about to tell you, thought Dax. Darling?
Yes?
You’re getting blood and dirt all over that hand-braided rug.
Tara looked down. Her skin was a mosaic of blackish-red smears and stains. Chunks of mud, broken leaves and a few snapped twigs clung to her black hair. One forearm was caked with dried blood. Her sweat pants were shredded below the knee from running through the forest and her t-shirt ripped halfway up from making him a tourniquet.
Her bright eyes alone shone immaculate as she scowled, I’m so terribly sorry. I didn’t realize we would be bringing this fine rug with us to Secondcity! It’s so… me.
A valid point, Dax conceded with mock chagrin. Transporting the rug may prove challenging.
Tara threw her arms open, looking like an outraged, dirty raccoon, Well of all the pieces in the house, this carpet, my great aunt’s doula wove… she ran her hand over the rug like she was advertising a new hovcar, …should certainly be the one thing we take with us! She cocked her head soberly, Can we blow the foggy sky? I can hear you. Go on then, tell me about my father’s death. You said it was murder. Tara’s face warmed under the filth as her eyes narrowed, But I want to know who. And I want to know why!
Outside the window, sounds of particle fire and cyborg battle split the overcast morning.
Dax sighed, It is the why that matters most.
As soon as I know why, I’m gonna want to know who.
Fair enough. Dax raised up and looked over the window sill, then sat back down with a groan, meeting her eyes, Given the current situation, I’ll be brief. Your father, Dr. Marvin Adler, was murdered because of his invention.
The operating system for cyborgs? she pushed.
The Adler Code. The genesis of artificial life. But he was killed because, in so doing, he had discovered a way for organic consciousness to be replicated across a quantum network.
That’s why the Coyotes operate as a hive mind.
The Coyotes are unique. Modern cyborgs like our Rottweilers recognize themselves as individuals. They share information like a human team.
So why kill him? asked Tara. And didn’t the Coyotes kill my father themselves? Because of an error in their code?
So the legend goes, as perpetuated by the Architect.
They both ducked at the sound of an explosion followed by the mournful, far-off wailing of a wounded RIOT bot.
the Architect? pushed Tara when the noise had passed, raising her eyebrows. As in, the Office of the Architect?
Dax scratched his head in frustration, Yes, the man who socially engineered Vision and made demonizing alcohol the dominant cultural norm. That Architect.
Why would he want my father dead?
Because the Architect is a courtezan also. One of the first to manifest the power.
I don’t get it, pushed Tara, shaking her head. My father was courtezan too?
Yes.
Why didn’t you tell me?
I just found out myself. One of the eleven Darkpool Laboratories employees who died with your father that day was a biomechanical engineer from Tel Aviv University named Dr. Sam Goldstein. It is believed this Dr. Goldstein was a double agent, a mole planted by the Office of the Architect. He infected the nascent Coyote intrastream with a crippling, 24 hour virus that caused them to murder the staff and escape into the wild.
Tara stared glumly at the woven rug, I’ve asked them. I know that sounds crazy, but the Coyotes know what I mean. When I asked them why they murdered my father? They know it pains me. They are sorry, but they don’t remember it. She looked up at Dax, Their will comes to me like a push, an intention. I believe them. She glowered, So what kind of information was this Dr. Goldstein providing to t
he Architect?
Just that, Dax lifted his eyebrows. The way you are able to hear the thoughts and intentions of the Coyotes? The way William can tether with the DOGS units.
What about it?
Your father discovered it was possible for certain people to push thoughts to certain cyborgs. Not just in the same room or line of sight, but across the holostream.
Tara licked her bloody lips, listening to his thoughts impatiently, The same way you change thoughts into voice… it’s the same with Vision, but on a greater scale. That’s how the Architect has been able to maintain control.
Before responding, Dax made a show of raising up. He took aim and fired, then slumped back down uncomfortably. He tapped his com, verbally breaking back into the other conversation he had been telepathically pushing into his combud, “On a related note, I expect our own masked asset is positively dying to stretch his legs.”
Tara smiled at him with affection, Three conversations at once, Daxane. How clever. You push the thoughts through your combud to a vocal avatar, talk to the team, and Joan, while you talk to me in person. My beautiful genius. So the Architect has twisted this same power… She frowned, noting his leg, You’re bleeding again.
I know, he responded with a sigh. We are running out of time. You must hear this.
She could see the effort fast draining him, yet he continued, You were asking if the Architect uses the same process to disseminate Vision across the holostream.
Yes.
It started after 1.9 Day. The environment was collapsing, fresh water was scarce. Marijuana and hemp were advertised as the only way to save the modern agriculture and textile industries. People were dying. Laws had to change, we needed hemp for food and fuel. The Architect took it a step further by incorporating his crusade against alcohol. He was a powerful courtezan, in the right place at the right time, a lobbyist for the marijuana industry who could sway the minds of any politician he made eye contact with.
Tara interrupted, mouthing the thoughts he pushed into her mind, Even the Architect didn’t know what a courtezan was back then. Regardless, soon influence wasn’t enough. He became obsessed with finding a way to allure… she looked at Dax sadly, …everyone. Jeezus. The slaughterhouses…
Dax pursed his lips, Thus, the mind of the humdroid is born. The Architect found that he couldn’t push thoughts across the holostream to everybody, but he could build a line of automated, neurological code into the computerized drill used for SAMCL surgeries. It was genius.
Tara shook her head, It’s sick is what it is. Every alcohol addict becomes a mindless advocate of prohibition. It’s like a virus spread by the prevailing culture.
Dax smiled, calm and present, his black pupils swallowing the wild yellow of his irises as he drew her focus deeper, pushing the rest.
The tension in her muscles faded. The stabs of pain where she had been rammed with the shotgun, the blood and guns and fear, all vanished as she walked fully onto the courtezan bridge.
The emerald color of her eyes disappeared behind her pupils and she pushed back, My father figured out how to digitize thought. When he found out that the Architect wanted to use this technology for mass mind control, he threatened to shut down the Coyote program. That’s when Dr. Goldstein uploaded the white algorithm to the Coyotes’ network. They murdered everyone, including Dr. Goldstein. How do we know all this?
Dax shrugged, The dolphins. Joan told me only when she thought it was time.
Tara looked at him. She felt anguish. Long held and greater secrets yet filled his mind.
Her cheeks flushed as the light of thoughts washed over, warming her like early morning sun, Oh love… she’s going to die. Joan knows she’s going to die. No… she closed her eyes and swooned with the sensation, darker now, like clouds blotting out the blue, Tell me, please, a tear formed in her near black eye, then fell, bringing a line of wet, brown freckles to light, what are you keeping from me?
His face was lost, dreaming, After we escape, I promise.
She pulled herself forward onto her knees, reached out both hands out and took his, making him put the lightning gun down, “You are building up a collection of promises no man can live up to, Daxane.” Her eyes were shining and obsidian, pulling him like a counterweight. She winced with a swell of sadness and squeezed his hands, “What is it? Every time you think of the Architect…” she opened her eyes again, “Today is what it all comes down to. Am I wrong?” Tara shrugged with assumption, “It’s your mother’s endgame.”
Dax drew his lips taught and pulled his hands free. He backed off the courtezan bridge.
Tara smiled, tight-lipped, and sat back, drawing her legs to one side, You know how furious that makes me. You think you’re going to die on me? You think I will allow that? To die, here? Never. She looked everyplace in the room but his face, You are arrogant and narcissistic… and are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.
She felt his warm, I love you… flow back, followed by a fast rising swell of fear.
Dax touched his com, picking up an emergency ping from Joan. Without another word, he leapt to his feet, grimacing, and threw himself on top of Tara, pulling her to the floor. He wrapped the long, free edge of the braided rug about their bodies. Their breath was hot in the carpet. Tara sneezed and screamed, inhaling dust. Still bridged, she had no choice but to let the fear pour in.
Her mind was the bottom half of the hourglass.
Something awful was going to happen.
The seconds counted down… seven, six, five, four, three, two, one.
Specialist McBride’s CRAB bot fired its particle cannon at the farmhouse.
William shouldered through the last of the rubble. He found Dax unconscious in the hallway outside the fractured doorjamb leading to his and Dorothy’s apartment. Tara sat beside him, cross-legged, arms around his chest. Her face was oddly resigned and peaceful.
She looked up when she saw his boots but only pushed the suggestion, Help him.
Acrid, blue smoke from the fire on the first floor filled the hall, flowing up the staircase. The floor of the guest room Dax had been shooting out of had partially collapsed. The brass bed was burning, hanging into the living room ceiling below. The knotty pine dresser had fallen into the hole in the floor also, but was held in place by a braided rug.
William crawled to evade the worst of the smoke that was gathering in a thick layer waist high. There was a crushing explosion outside, sounds of metal being ripped asunder.
He tapped his jaw, “Dory, what was that?”
“One of the crabs just destroyed the Town Car.”
“Okay, I need vitals on Dax.”
Joan’s response was immediate, “Daxane Julius Abner is alive. He suffers from smoke inhalation and blood loss, plus a mild concussion. Drone A7 is in route with a syringe of intracardiac atropine. The drone will arrive at your location in nineteen seconds. Judging from the structural integrity of the farmhouse, you should be able to access the drone’s delivery bay via the open window in the adjacent bedroom.”
“Half the floor’s gone,” said William.
“That is correct. Conversely, half remains intact. It will support a distributed weight of 178kg. Given that your body weight factors in…”
“I got it.”
William touched Tara’s hand.
She looked at him and pointed to her ear and shouted, “My ears! They’re ringing so bad, I can’t hear!”
William mouthed the words, I’ll be back, and crawled into the guest room. The flames were getting larger through the hole in the floor. He stepped as lightly as he could in his boots, moving along the far wall where the dresser had been. The drone appeared in the window. He jumped the last meter to meet it, hands holding onto the only solid section of window sill that remained. The drone deployed its thin, silver cargo tray and he snatched up the enclosed syringe. The drone buzzed off, and as he turned back, the bed and dresser fell the rest of the way through. William jumped to the far corner as the braided rug slipped
into the burning pit that had been the farmhouse living room. Sparks and greedy fingers of flame momentarily raged into the empty space, then receded, belching fresh plumes of white carpet smoke.
He tapped his com, “Joan, can you activate the attic fan?”
“Negative, William Thomas Angevine. The wireless electricity relays in the router were fused by the particle stream. The farmhouse has no power source at this time.”
“Hell then,” he said, coughing. The smoke burned his eyes and throat. Somewhere in his memories, William remembered a bonfire made of railroad ties. He scooted low, hugging the wall until he was out, and fell to his knees on the other side of Dax’s unconscious form.
“Is Tara all right?” asked Dorothy. “We’ve of course got no telemetry on her.”
William looked into Tara’s sad, green eyes, and felt her anger irradiated with fear as he said quietly, “She’s all right.” He took Tara’s hand again, “She’s a rock. The concussion from the blast made her deaf is all.”
“All right. Talk to Joan, honey. I’m trying to monitor the parabola of THOR’S targeting matrix.”
“What?”
“Joan’s taking down a co2 scrubber.”
“Joan’s doing…? Nevermind!”
“It’s cover for our evacuation. I’m scared, honey. But I want to see this through.”
“We’re gonna make it, Dory.”
“You…” she stopped. “Here’s Joan back.”
“Hello, William Thomas Angevine,” said the dolphin.
William already had the cap off the small white syringe, “Joan, got the syringe. Needle’s four centimeters long.”
“Can you locate the carotid artery in his neck?”
“Yes,” said William, coughing as he palpitated for the artery below Dax’s jaw.
“Honey, you gotta get out there,” said Dorothy.
“I’m doin’ fifteen things…”
“THOR is stalking the assault bots.”
“He’s a big boy.”
William found the artery. The pulse was weak. He pushed the syringe into Dax’s neck and injected the atropine. Dax sat bolt upright almost instantly. He looked at Tara’s crying eyes, reached up and winced as he touched the back of his head where the falling dresser had struck him. He looked at William, pushed gratitude and took his hand. William led, pulling them both to their feet, then put his shoulder under Dax. They crouched as low as they could, lungs on fire. William escorted them through the path he had made, moving slower than he would have liked down the stairs. He kicked the burning railing out of their way into the foyer as they gained the end of the staircase. Dax limped, but clung to him with the maddened strength that comes of shock.
Absorption: Phase 03 (The Eighteenth Shadow) Page 22
