The Last Mayor Box Set 3

by Michael John Grist

  After that they fire off like popcorn. I barely make it away. Perhaps, at some deep level, it is the chopped pieces of the wraith left inside keeping me upright and walking. I know I could hardly do it myself. Some fusion of Sandbrooke and Feargal makes me take another step, and another, while my conscious mind warps and flexes. God knows what they want.

  POP

  POP

  POP

  The line for miles around vanishes. A snowstorm descends from a thunderhead sky. I trudge into the thick of it, alone, as always.

  INTERLUDE 5

  By the time James While landed on Sakhalin Island he'd approved initial construction on seven new Ark locations, spaced around the globe with substantial longitudinal gaps between them, pending final oversight from Joran Helkegarde.

  The man had proved surprisingly resilient.

  Even with a withered arm and the guilt of every lost subject in the Arrays on his head, he'd hunkered down and produced a steady stream of innovative, enlightened reports in the past five hours, seemingly proving himself above suspicion. After their first talk in the midst of the Array exodus, While hadn't considered him to be worth much, but he was changing that calculation by the hour.

  Sometimes you had to spin up a new plate.

  Now the hacking of the transmission signal, replacing Helkegarde's 'Hello' with something quite different, was the real question.

  Mid-flight he'd sent mounds of data over to Helkegarde, from Rachel Heron about the T4, every readout they had from the Arrays before the signal blew them, the segments of the transmission that they'd been able to capture, video of the beasts in the pens, Joran's own brainwave patterns along with the patterns of other survivors, and more, and within an hour Joran had filed an early report and requested more. He wanted his Alpha teams back in labs working with line equipment. He wanted every Array head gathered for multiple conferences. He wanted oversight capability on the plans going forward.

  While had smiled at that. From suspected saboteur to demanding oversight within a few hours was impressive, but then that was because his buttons were so simple to press. Helkegarde was ambitious to a fault, and when shown a possibility to recover his status as a brilliant and important innovator in the quest for 'God's mind', he had leapt on it.

  His first report had outlined all the ways brain activity had shifted since the blast. Next came his report on the transmission; it seemed to be a kind of encrypted key, designed to unlock the T4, triggered through the telomere mechanism for aging.

  "You're not an expert in telomeres," While had argued back.

  "I can recognize copies," Helkegarde answered sharply, from his new lab. "I looked at Heron's data, and though I'm no cryptologist, I can spot a pair match when I see one. This T4, have you spoken to her about what it can do?"

  "I'm heading to Sakhalin now."

  "Find out. What I'm seeing here…" Helkegarde trailed off. "It boggles the mind. That anyone could know about this, that it might even exist. It defies all natural law. You said the T4 was found in the Arctic ice? It's not possible. Evolution would never make something like this, it doesn't make sense."

  While had gazed at Helkegarde for a moment. He truly was a smart man, capable of creative leaps that pushed beyond the edge of the data he had. Perhaps he was capable of the very thing he was getting worked up about. Only a genius who excelled in multiple disciplines could have put together the threat they were facing now. He had to keep a watch on him.

  "Leave the genetic biology to Heron. I need you focusing on what the signal did, how it's changing people, and what we can do to stop it."

  "I can't do that without full access to the biological data. You're holding back."

  While almost smiled. It had taken Helkegarde only hours to spot the gaps in the Logchain that it had taken him years to find. But then he'd never been a scientist, just a patterns analyst. He'd never had the baseline knowledge necessary to see the outliers.

  "You'll get it when I think you need it. Now talk me through what else you need."

  Helkegarde asked for twelve new Arrays, and assurances for himself and Sovoy, and greater autonomy and authority. James While granted some and said he'd think about the others.

  There was a great deal to do.

  Two hours later he stepped off his private jet onto the narrow runway of the Logchain facility on Sakhalin Island.

  The sky was a mottled white and slate, like a strange rash. Jagged scar-like black rocks encircled the facility, not tall enough to be called mountains, too fractured to be called hills. It felt like stepping back into the wake of an Ice Age, with the land torn into furrows by vast fronts of ice.

  He shivered. The air was cold but humid at the same time. He sneezed as he reached the bottom of the stairs; allergies. God knew what pollen was in the air here. Rachel Heron was waiting for him on the worn asphalt, Persian beauty bundled in a thick red parka.

  "It's good to have you here, James," she said.

  He nodded. They'd slept together once, at a SEAL conference. It had been excellent exercise and a vigorous affirmation of their mutual attraction. Once though had been enough.

  He looked past her to the glass and concrete campus of ten buildings that SEAL money had built, long before he was even born. The Logchain was designed to investigate and decode the human genome in depths none were attempting anywhere else on the planet. This was investigative science of the highest caliber, and Rachel was one of the keenest minds he knew, but there were secrets here too, kept from him for years.

  This had been coming for a long time.

  "Rachel Heron, I'm placing you under arrest."

  Her pleasant expression faded as the words sunk in. "What? Why?"

  "You know why," he said, as a stream of tactically armed soldiers poured out of the belly of his jet. In seconds Heron's small retinue were surrounded.

  "I don't. And you don't have the authority to do this, James." His men tightened plastic cuffs round her wrists. "I'm a SEAL Head."

  "The SEAL is in pieces, fragmented by this attack. I'm barely keeping it together. You have been withholding information from me, and I need to see it."

  Heron blanched in outrage. "What information? You've seen everything."

  While studied her face. He'd thought he'd known her. Perhaps he had. It was possible she just didn't know, but that argued for incompetence, and he didn't believe she was incompetent. She was too smart not to know.

  "I've been monitoring unaccounted for, heavily encoded data streams leaving the Logchain for years now, Rachel. Either it's with your approval or it's sabotage of the SEAL. In both cases I need to take you into custody."

  Her outrage became confusion. "Wait, you're talking about the deep pipes? Jesus, James, talk to Harrison. How was I to know you weren't in on that? He kept a private line on certain research threads, that's all I know. It's certainly not sabotage!"

  James took her by the arm and started the long perp walk to her own campus. "You knew I didn't know. So now I'm talking to you. You're going to show me everything you've been doing here, and what you've been sending to Harrison."

  She spluttered something about privilege and security clearance, but he ignored it. He'd guessed a long time ago the feeds were directed to Olan Harrison, one of the few remaining areas in the SEAL still shuttered to him. It had always made Heron an intelligence target he'd hoped to convert. Sleeping with her had bought him social capital, but she'd been too careful to let her guard slip. Once was enough to know that.

  Now, though, was his chance.

  * * *

  His team moved smoothly into position, well prepared to infiltrate without raising alarm. They wore the right uniform, carried the right badges, and their arrival had been pre-authorized by James While himself, the consigliore of the SEAL, and none would question them.

  They reached the comms facilities before any alarm could go out, warning Olan Harrison what was happening at his longstanding pet project. One more blackout in the midst of the global chaos would
go relatively unremarked. Besides, While didn't anticipate needing much time to get to the bottom of things here.

  He frogmarched Rachel through the open square at the center of the Logchain, paved with red bricks and garlanded with a central fountain. Four buildings were spread out around it while the remaining six lay along a central spine leading away to the north; some larger, some smaller, all interconnected, but none what he was looking for.

  He'd studied the plans, both the ones before construction and the ones that had been altered afterwards. Tunnels were missing. Rooms were missing. On the plane he'd pulled in favors and compromised himself to find them, but the evidence they offered was incontrovertible. Something was happening and he'd been cut out of the loop since he'd started as COO, sealed out by Olan and Rachel at every step. It had never been that way with the Multicameral Array. Such was the problem of inheriting programs you hadn't initiated.

  He stopped in front of Building 3, a squat dome called the 'Donut' which housed a circular workflow analysis line. He gave Rachel a slight jostle, forcing her to look at him.

  "We're here."

  "Where, at the Donut? Jesus, James, you've finally cracked. You want to run some blood samples through the ring?"

  His security personnel circled in tightly on the doors.

  "Rachel, stop bullshitting me. I know there's something happening here underground. There are tunnels, secret facilities. Don't tell me they're for night soil. Whether it's sabotage or not is for me to decide."

  Rachel snorted. "You've lost it. But all right, I'll show you. You're COO, perhaps it's time you knew."

  "Lead on," he said, and she did. Through the door she gave a nod to someone, a building supervisor While recognized from his files. He nodded one of his team over, and they cuffed the supervisor, adding him to the procession.

  "What's that for?" Rachel demanded. "He's not even cleared for the tunnels."

  "Rachel, please. No more signals. Imagine I'm very serious, and holding a gun to your head."

  Her beautiful face split in derision. "You wouldn't dare."

  "There are few things I wouldn't dare. Here, I believe, are the elevators."

  It was a small security door she'd been studiously ignoring and walking past. A flash of panic lit in her eyes.

  "These lead into containment. We're not wearing suits. We can go round…"

  While gave a signal, and one of his men pulled a black metal battering ram out of a hard case rucksack. He swung it and pounded the door once, twice, then the hinges squealed inward and Rachel Heron held up a hand.

  "I have a pass card, James, I'll do it."

  She scanned her card; the light flashed green and the door clicked open. On the other side was a hallway with no doors. While pushed her down it first, followed by his team. There was a left turn, a right, then an elevator door.

  "Containment?" he said.

  Rachel held her card to the security panel, and behind the door the mechanism whirred into life.

  "It wasn't personal," she said. "Withholding this from you. What Olan wants, he gets. He's the King, after all."

  While snorted.

  Rachel granted him a withering smile. "Don't think you know everything about him. There are depths even you don't see."

  While met her smile with cold indifference, realizing something important. Yes, she had thought of him that way; a useful tool, perhaps, while she alone knew the truth.

  "Get in," he said, as the elevator doors opened.

  "Don't be angry," she answered dismissively, and stepped in. "It doesn't become you." While followed and held up a hand to stop his team from following.

  "I'm not angry. Push the button."

  Rachel pushed the button and the carriage started down.

  "I spoke to him just an hour ago," she said. "He's directing our investigation personally. He won't be happy that you're interfering. The Logchain has always conducted its own oversight."

  "I don't care if he's happy. Neither should you. There are bigger matters at stake."

  The carriage came to a halt and the doors opened.

  "Here are your tunnels," Rachel said.

  Ahead stretched a long, tall white hallway, with floor-to-ceiling glass panes set into the walls at regular alternating intervals. There was a funny feeling in the air, like a stiff nicotine buzz mixed with a chill breeze.

  "It doesn't mean anything that we have this," Rachel started, her voice becoming strange now, defensive and dismissive at once. "You'll see, there are no leaks here, nothing to investigate. You'll find-"

  While started forward, pulling Rachel with him. She lurched to keep up.

  The first glass panel drew closer on the left. His heart began to thump in his chest and beads of sweat sprang up on his temples despite the sharpening chill in the air.

  "I prefer not to come this close," Rachel said. "The shielding is far from perfect, and they make for a hell of a headache."

  While felt the headache already beginning to form in the back of his head, matched with a dark premonition of what he was about to see. Five more steps, then five more, and he was standing in front of the first glass pane, and looking inside, at-

  A gray man.

  He stood naked like a specimen in a cage, thin gray skin sucked tight to thin bones, eyes a bright, flashing white. Clamps held him perfectly immobile at arms and thighs, while in each corner of his white-lined 'display' box there were large gray triangles that seemed to waver if James looked at them for too long, like a heat haze.

  A genetic type one, in the flesh, expressed into reality.

  Just as they'd promised they'd never done.

  "I didn't make them all," Rachel said quickly. "I inherited them, I just studied them. Harrison was very clear about secrecy."

  James While stared at the figure behind the glass; far more than he'd expected to find. Rachel kept talking but he didn't look at her, as everything she said now was almost certainly a lie.

  This was it. He bit his lip so hard it bled. He'd suspected secrets but to find this at the heart of the Logchain? He should have come in earlier, using up his political capital in the SEAL, perhaps, but exposing this before…

  Before what? Before these things were tied to the hydrogen line? Maybe they already were. Maybe this whole damn thing was inevitable.

  "Come on," he said, and dragged her roughly, walking too fast for her to easily keep up. Her high heels clacked staccato on the floor.

  "I don't like to come this deep without additional shielding," Rachel stammered as he pulled her on. "We have some rudimentary protections, working with magnets, but it doesn't do much for…"

  He tuned her out and reached the second cell. Inside it was genetic type two, a giant red monster. It was enormous, easily three times as tall as a man, seated and hunched over to fit beneath the already-tall ceiling. The chill emanating from it was visceral, cutting through his skin and making his blood run cold. Its bright red eyes hung overhead in its giant head, and just looking at them sent a flood of confusion across his thoughts.

  Rachel said something. He turned the world, honing his focus to cut through the uncertainty, and looked at her.

  "What have you done?" he hissed, then started forward again, pulling her with him.

  "Stop now, it's getting dangerous," Rachel shouted, then tried to punch him in the face. He caught it on the chest and strode on.

  "Look, there are signs," she shouted, pointing.

  There were signs on the walls. Biohazard. He ignored her and kept walking

  At the next cell was type three, a single fizzing black creature draped in dangling white ribbons of skin. His headache thickened but he couldn't stop now, even though Rachel Heron was lashing at him with both her fists and feet, shouting.

  He had to see it all. The glass windows stretched on and on.

  Beyond type three was four, a pink one with too many arms, then five was a melted yellow thing, then six a shimmery black wraith, then after that Rachel passed out and he couldn't drag her
any further. The black thing pressed to the glass and seemed to reach directly into James While's head, forcing needles of uncertainty into his thoughts.

  He spun the world, dragged Rachel Heron up into his arms, and started back at a run.

  By the end of the hall his nose was bleeding freely but he couldn't stop moving for fear he wouldn't start again. The blood pooled on Rachel's belly until he got into the elevator and hit the button, then the headache kicked into high gear and he dropped to the floor.

  The doors closed slowly, and the hallway shimmered ahead, the end not even in sight. How many glass cells, he wondered, as he slumped on his side. How many pieces of the T4 had already been 'expressed' onto the real world, and how long had they been here, waiting to be broken free?

  11. READ ME

  In a mile or two I'm almost dead. Every trudging step cracks ice somewhere in my clothing. After a time I jettison the sled, even though it has everything I need to survive up here, because I'm not going to survive with it.

  There's nothing. This land is a waste. I'm ready to lie down and die, but the wispy pieces of the Feargal/Sandbrooke-wraith inside me pushes on.

  It doesn't talk. It's bits of different people only, shards of the upper half and not the legs, but I suppose that's bad enough. It just keeps working my muscles, and on I go.

  In time, there's a house, and I break in. It's not a normal house; it's a mansion, some billionaire's lakeside palace on the edge of existence, acting like a Bond villain. I pass through like I'm seeing only one frame of my life out of five, out of ten, barely registering a room before I'm through it.

  I smash up furniture and put it in the middle of a marble floor. I have a little bottle of gasoline in my pocket, saved for just this eventuality, and a fresh box of matches. Feargal's touch guides me as I spray the juice and set the spark, then I lay back and wriggle out of my freezing, damp clothes. I see my black feet. I see the cut on my thigh turning dark. The marble is freezing but soon the fire licks up, and I lie on the seared, icy bedding of my clothes and shiver.