by Ryan Burnett
He started to chuckle again and I had to join him despite myself. I was broken out of my
laughing fit by the sound of a cap being popped off of a bottle of
beer. I looked at Rob and saw him taking a long slow pull from a brown bottle.
“When did you grab the brew?” I asked surprised.
“Look around Marcus. This is Club Pangea, they’ve always got a fully stocked bar. I’m actually half tempted to pour myself a couple of fingers of the good stuff. Do you want a drink?” Rob replied after finishing his swig.
I took a look around me “Well we are at a crime scene man....” I said.
“A crime scene at a bar. Besides there's no one around apparently everybody is busy with some business all the way on the other side of town so...why not?” he said as he popped open a second bottle on the side of the bar counter and offered it to me. I grabbed the bottle from him and took a long pull feeling the foamy liquid course down my throat.
“Well when in Rome.” I exclaimed after finishing my first drought, “Follow me we should find where they keep their security booths.” I said as we both sipped our beers and went through the doors normally reserved for security personnel. We wandered down the back rooms for a
little bit trying different door handles hoping one was left open. I hadn’t bought our heavy equipment with us so if we couldn’t catch a break here I would just have to hope that between Rob and I we could manage to jimmy one of these doors open without making too much noise. I was almost ready to give up as we approached the last set of rooms near the back exit
when we struck pay dirt.
I knew that in the midst of a shooting there had to be someone who was rattled enough to forget to lock their office behind them. The access point wasn’t password protected either, presumably so the police could easily access the necessary information for their investigation. As we entered rob spoke and said “That other cop is right outside, I'll watch the door just in case. Your tricked out VRN can get what we need without leaving a trail behind right?”
“You know it. You should consider getting an upgrade buddy” I said with a smile.
“Yeah, well maybe after this job I just may have to do that” he replied. Closing my eyes I brought up my VRN’s overlay for the access point to the security system’s network and calibrated my VRN to it before un-tieing the mental knot that allowed
virtual reality to flow over the real world.
I was sitting at my office with the magnificent city skyline right outside. Electrojazz tinkling in the background reflecting my upbeat mood and adding a sense of ambiance to the office. I pressed a button on my desk buzzing an unseen secretary who answered in a alluringly
sweet yet completely professional voice “What can I do for you Mr. Nellix?” she asked.
“Elaine, could you please download some facial recognition software. Charge my
expense account.” I replied
“At once Mr. Nellix is there anything else I can do for you?” She said.
“No that will be all” I concluded.
In a few moments a large screen TV appeared on my desk with a screen divided into at least a dozen boxes arranged into a grid. I brought to mind a mental picture of Alexander Sitavi and watched as the boxes on the giant monitor began to cycle through hours upon hours of video at high-speed trying to find a match. It took about three minutes before a match was actually found, a time table that was quick enough to make me think that I would be grimacing once I reviewed the cost of the program I had just purchased
. I looked at the time of the video and it was dated a week ago. I focused on the box and it expanded to fill the entire monitor space and zoom in on the face in question. I almost fell out of my chair and fumbled to hit the intercom button again.
“How certain are we that this is a positive match” I asked hurriedly.
“We are 97.65899934210076% certain based on the jaw structure, nose line, brow slope, and pupil/iris analysis.”
I knew Alexander's face looked familiar and now I knew why. There he was gaunter than in the picture in the midst of some electricity and alcohol infused dancing frenzy but it was unmistakably him. Wrapped in leather and with his hair spiked up I could definitely see it now.
As I looked at the video of the young man, lounging, dancing, and generally having a good time a chill surged down my spine. His hands glowed in the dark scenery, iridescent Ultraviolet tattoos of eyeballs adorned each one of the young man’s fist as he downed shots and chatted up the ladies at the bar. Either this tattoo was the mark of some kind of gang affiliation or Alex was the shooter… I couldn’t rule out either scenario but some part of me just knew it was Alex that had shot up Club Pangea. It may have been because the acid in me at the time causing me to latch onto a random detail of a fragment that stuck in my mind like a piece of shrapnel. It might be what some would call gut instinct. Hell it could have even been some insane imagining, but I KNEW those eyes were the exact same ones I saw that night. I knew it was Alex, and something told me that this job was swiftly going to become a lot more complicated.
Chapter 11
Cid
12:46:33
The helicopter ride hadn't given me ample time to think. Research Lab B was located roughly an hour outside the perimeter of the suburbs that surrounded Arc city. Getting there via aerial transport took nearly no time at all and it was shocking how fast the turbulent progress of industrial society gave way to undeveloped land. The land was now mostly fallow except for a few luxury farms and fruit orchards. It is amazing how technology can change the progress of an
entire planet. There were nights were I still let myself forget about my obligations and get lost in reading about history. Not too long ago humanity was torn between poisoning itself by adding chemicals and compounds in order to make natural food something that could be mass
produced or conceding to the limits of nature and letting more and more of our populace suffer from starvation and malnutrition. Science as usual had found the answer. Synthetically engineered vitamin and protein fibers that could be flavored and woven into “cakes” or “meat”
slabs, or whatever other form and flavor that a consumer could possibly want. No more worrying about hormones or whatever other potentially harmful processes companies had to use to accelerate the growing process. Instead they had simply eliminated the need to “grow” altogether.
After a certain point it became much easier (and more cost efficient) to cultivate nutrients, rather than to nurture and alter a complex organism. Entire nations could be fed on the engineered substance and all could reap the benefit since it technically did not violate any religious doctrines
about eating certain animals. Now that organic food was something only the wealthy could afford the failing agricultural industry had rapidly transformed into a high class novelty industry that easily maintained itself and helped to fill the government's pockets instead of emptying
them. The only crops profitable enough to be raised in bulk were the age old vices. Tobacco, cannabis, poppy, even the grains used for the production of alcohol still flourished, but they were the last holdouts from a different era.
It was stories like this that inspired me. Of course there were those that opposed this new cheap, affordable, and renewable substance but their voices were not loud enough to drown out the ever growing orchestra of progress that humanity had been a part of since the discovery of fire. Compromises were the tools of a previous age. An age that catered to the weak for the detriment of all. There was always more than one way to achieve results but the extremes brought about by absolute focus were the only things that could be depended upon. When failure meant death on a massive scale you needed that kind of zealous mentality to insure survival. Sometimes loss was unavoidable, in this case the loss being the many that had died of organ failure in the testing phases, before the long term effects of complete diet replacement was fully
understood and accounted for by subtle tweaks in the syn
thetic formulae, but gain without loss was an unscientific and idealistic dream. At least their deaths were not in vain like the deaths of those destined to be born poor and hungry in a third world nation. I supposed that was the real difference between the philosophy of progress and the philosophy of sentimentality: where tragedy was unavoidable progress created sacrifices and sentimentality created waste.
I had only begun to scratch the surface of the thoughts that had
rose to the forefront of my mind because of the change in scenery when the helicopter began its descent towards Research Lab B. The auxiliary facility was actually much bigger than the main lab, a fact that was amplified by the flat landscape and surroundings that were empty
of mostly everything except grass. It was a closed dome structure which from the ground looked reminiscent of a sports arena. Underneath the main structure were several basement levels with strictly controlled access. Unlike the facility in Arc city, here security could be tailored to my exact specifications and I could be certain that the presence and activity of the company was being monitored by no one but myself.
“We'll be landing soon Mr. Sitavi” said a voice over the intercom. I relaxed deeper into my chair while shaking my head to no one in particular. Another idiot in my employ being paid to restate the obvious. I looked down at the rapidly expanding compound of the facility. Feeling more secure knowing even now that its networks were private and secure. I was put even more at ease when I considered the fact that there was no official record of this facility on any of the company’s publicly accessible information releases. I was conscious however of the emergency still at hand and despite myself my back was already clenching up again making my reflections and attempts at relaxation utterly meaningless. I was impatient to check on the Jack's progress and that one thought became the center of my mind as we touched down on the helipad just outside the lab.
The squad of armed escorts that emerged from the lab knew enough not to waste my time with a greeting and instead quickly formed a protective diamond formation and kept speed with my brisk walk towards the front entrance. The doors opened and I didn’t change my gait as the metal detectors and bio scans all read the identity signature of my VRN and gave me instant clearance through the facility’s check points. I did not acknowledge a single worker and instead made a bee line towards the industrial metallic elevators that would take me to basement level 6H where my private quarters were housed. Once the elevator had finished it's smooth journey and completed a secondary silent scan of my VRN before opening the door I took a seat upon the king sized bed that was standard for all my living quarters. In this room my VRN had access to certain features that I had implemented especially for my privacy. In Arc city I was expected to be accessible, I was more or less a public figure there, but here I could actually cultivate the solitude that I craved. I activated my VRN’s visual overlay and configured the security to lockdown the floor that I was on and to filter out all of the incoming transmissions not initiated by me.
I wasted no time in settling myself and entering the semi-dream state necessary to use my invention. The instant I was conscious of being seated in my throne before I mentally called for the activation of the Damocles program. The first thing I felt upon activation was disorientation and nausea. The neural pathing of this experimental bio-networking technology was stressful on the brain and the body in ways we were still seeking to fully understand. For now but it was merely something that would pass and must be endured.
I struggled to focus on the images in front of me as another wave of nausea passed through my body nearly causing me to deactivate my VRN altogether so that I could run to the bathroom and vomit. Test results with our bio-networking projects had always been inconsistent at best, apparently there was an art to this and it was one that I still struggled to master. It was difficult task trying to maintain absolute focus without having my psyche attempt (in vain) to take control.
The Damocles program allowed me access to a person’s senses. This person essentially acted as a camera whose movement I had no control over. Despite this the program still allowed me to retain some form of power over the subject the program had been installed to. The secondary portion of the program consisted of activating a feedback loop within the program itself. Once my command was given, the program would flood his sensory organs. This would result in roughly seventy two hours of painfully deafening sound and blindness. If I so desired I could even set this command to be executed once certain conditions were met….such as once adrenaline levels had spiked or the subject’s pulse had accelerate, effectively assuring that the subject would be rendered helpless at a time when swift action and thinking were necessary. There would be no notice of this looming command given to the carrier of the program.
As of now the program was imperfect but it was still a tool through which I could use to insure loyalty. I had not had the program installed on the Jack’s VRN on a mere whim. When it came down to the hard truth of things I did not suspect him of being disloyal, however anyone who had been employed in my inner circle for this long could almost certainly arrange to commit a disloyal act, such as revealing company secrets or intentionally letting a crucial assignment fail, and then after the sordid act was done. Retreat to the safety and comfort of a secure location
where their temporary disability could be endured. It was a much different thing to know that my displeasure could potentially result in a crippling affliction the next time that your life was on the line. This fear of that possibility would be my true insurance policy, and knowing that the Jack knew exactly what the Damocles program was capable of made it a little easier to be a
passive viewer for the time being. As capable as the Jack was a handicap like that on his current mission would swiftly become fatal.
I tried once again to focus not on the images themselves but on accepting the images and perceiving them as the result of my own eyes and the Jack's world became to take on a clearer shape. The Jack seemed to be surrounded by charred wreckage and debris. His hands were wrapped in black leather gloves as he examined the data consoles. He must have been in the information storage units of the University research facility. It was a good place to start. I was pleased at the Jack's willingness to jump back into the thick of things although I was
skeptical if his investigation here would be fruitful. For all his flaws, Alex was clever and whoever was assisting him seemed to be quite intelligent as well. All of the data would have been copied and stolen before the destruction of the servers and it would be doubtful that any clues would be left behind that could lead to whatever clandestine locale they were using to hide him.
As the Jack poked around some more sifting through the interior of one of the least thoroughly destroyed data consoles, I wondered whether Alex was in hiding or if he was being held against his will. I had no true competitors or rivals in the technology sector and even the federal government itself should have had no way of knowing Alex's true potential and value to me. The Jack spoke aloud in his quiet, humorless, and stoic voice presumably for my benefit.
“It is impossible to be certain of the details due to the extent of the fire damage, but it does not seem as if the cases to any of the terminals have been removed in a hacking attempt prior to the
destruction of the facility. The fire itself also did not seem to be meant to obscure evidence but was used solely as a means of indiscriminate destruction. Moving on to the next floor.” Before exiting the room he pressed himself against the doorway and peered around the corner making sure no one was roaming the hallways. As he climbed to the upper floors I could make out the sound of distant yelling and shouting coming from elsewhere on campus; a sound
that soon began to mix with the authoritative keening of approaching sirens. As he ascended the staircases three at a time in long swift strides, I noticed that he completely bypassed the student research sections and went straight for the top floors. He peered down at the blackened scanner that used to serve as the security b
arrier separating these top security clearance floors from the rest of the research facility.
“Once again although the fire damage is severe the scanner itself does not seem to have been physically tampered with. This leads me to the conclusion that the fire was either an inside job committed by a researcher or that the forces responsible has access to technology that we have not accounted for. I will be checking my underworld contacts for information concerning
that possibility.” said the Jack calmly.
As he opened the door a twin wave of nausea and frustration broke over my cranium and threatened to sever my connection. The annoyance over the lack of control and the actions of this unknown enemy were impairing me and I had to wonder if whether a brief reprieve to gather
my will was necessary before I proceeded with monitoring the investigation. The nausea eventually passed however and I fell back into the nearly intolerably passive viewing role, all the
while wondering just who the hell was responsible for this and what was their goal? Did they want to expose me? Destroy my research? What did they know about Alex and I? As my focused began to shift to my own considerations the image began to blur and become indistinct. I would
have to re-evaluate the situation at another point in time, and concentrate on the task at hand. It wasn't long before the image began to sharpen again as I saw clearly through the Jack's eyes.
The damage appeared to be just as bad here, nearly everything was scorched beyond any resemblance of function. The extent of the damage made it clear that without the solid concrete construction of the facility the fire would have been more than enough to cause the
