Code Breakers: Beta (2 page)

“What’s Criborg? Is that what I am? Is it a manufacturer?”

Gabe shook his head.

“Then what?”

Checking a slate that he took from his robes, Gabe stood and said in a hurry, “It’s time to go. Follow me and do as I say. Ya might just make it outta here.” He glanced back to the door, waited, and then moved towards to her.

“How the hell can I trust you after what you did?” Petal said.

“Please, Petal. It’s me. Ya know me! I’m trying to help ya, girl.”

Petal refused to move. “I’d rather die in this place.” Which of course was ridiculous, but she could see the sweat bead on his forehead. He was definitely working against these people in some manner. Getting her out seemed important, and she’d take that opportunity to get the truth from him. She damned well deserved it after he abandoned her. He was always supposed to back her up. That’s what they did for each other.

His voice was thick with sincerity, and despite everything, deep down she wanted to trust him again. He was Gabe, after all, her mentor, father figure, and best friend. She thought about her options: trust him and potentially escape, or trust him and what? Get captured again? They already had her captive. They could do anything they wanted with her.

“Tell me,” she said. “Is Gerry alive? What happened when these bitches took me from Jasper’s men?”

“I don’t know if Gerry made it. I know that he defeated the AI. Trapped it inside Jasper’s body. The Family took him away. Since then, everything’s gone quiet, and the Meshwork’s offline, or being suppressed by something. There’re no communications. Enna’s working on it though.”

She knew in her heart Gerry could still be alive. Especially if The Family had taken him away. She had no real way of knowing for sure beyond a hunch, but while she had it, she’d cling to it until proven otherwise. Without that, she wasn’t sure she could bring herself to acknowledge he was gone. The fact The Family had taken him meant something. Promised a glimmer of hope. “What happened to me? Why was I brought here? Who the hell are they?” she said.

Gabe fidgeted with impatience. He frequently turned towards the door at the slightest sound. With a sigh, realising Petal wasn’t going anywhere voluntarily, he said. “This group call ‘emselves the Red Widows. They took ya from the wreckage of Jasper’s Jaguar, and brought ya here.”

“Where’s here? It’s Seca’s place, ain’t it?”

A knowing smile stretched his wrinkled and worn face. “Yeah, we’re in Darkhan. Red Widow took it over. They’re slowly taking over the whole city. Wiped out all Seca’s followers in a single assault. I’d have sympathy for ‘em if they weren’t just as brutal.”

“So what’s their story? What do they want from me?”

“They’re fanatics,” Gabe said. “Mostly an alliance of survivors from Russia and Chechnya. There’s more than any of us, including The Family, ever realised. Most of ‘em lived underground like bugs waiting to swarm the earth. Enna had me infiltrate their ranks, which weren’t easy. Ya see, they are the descendants of the widows of the men that were killed during the war. They blame men for it all: the war, the deaths, the loss of their sons and fathers. Look, we gotta move, gotta get ya out of it. They’ll kill ya eventually. Ya can’t help ‘em with what they want.”

Petal crossed her arms defiantly. She refused to go anywhere until she knew what the hell he was talking about. And she took a degree of satisfaction seeing him panic. “And that is?”

“Their crusade. They want the servers. Old Grey, and the one Len’s people were protecting. They wanna track down those who instigated the war, killed their men. Hell, they wanna eradicate all men. They’re tolerating me because of the information and promises I gave. They’ll kill me too, eventually, I’m sure.”

“So why take me?”

Natalya’s voice rose from outside, issuing some curt command in her Russian language. Gabe wiped the sweat from his forehead, flashed another glance at the door as if he were expecting someone to come bursting through any second. “I don’t know the full story,” he said, rushing his words out, keeping his voice low. “It’s something to do with Criborg. I tried to find out, but I’m only tolerated so far. Only so much info I can get access to.”

“Are you coming with me?” Petal asked as he pushed her towards another door at the rear of the room.

Gabe ignored her, checked his slate again. His face hardened. “Okay, ready?”

“For what?”

“To run!”

He gestured across the slate and pocketed it inside his long, flowing robes that matched the others. Although unlike them, he wore no red scarf.

Petal tucked her implant chip into the single breast pocket of her prison suit. Her instincts kicked in and she tried to active her internal networking transceiver hoping to connect with something, anyone. Of course, nothing happened. No implant meant no access to her systems. But before she could examine further, Gabe grabbed her by the arm and pulled her through the door.

The room was empty of Red Widows. A rack of computer screens lined the left wall. Beyond that, it was just another grey Steelcrete box lit by the dull overhead OLED bulbs.

“Behind the right wall is a tunnel,” Gabe said. Sweat patches grew dark beneath his arms. “Ya have to go through it. It’ll take ya out behind the city. From there follow the coordinates on this slate.” He took a beat-up slate from within the folds of his robe and handed it to her. His eyes flittered, as if he were holding something back. Petal wanted to press him on it when he pushed her to the right wall.

Gabe entered some codes into one of the computer terminals. The right wall slid open revealing an escape tunnel. He took a small pistol from inside his robes. Petal recognised it. It was one similar to what Jasper and his goons had used during their attack in City Earth.

“Take this and run. Go east. Follow the coordinates on the slate. Keep ya head down. Ya a wanted girl.”

Petal grabbed the pistol and held it to his head.

“Why, Gabe? Why did you hand us to Seca’s men?”

Gabe clenched his teeth in irritation. “I was following orders from Enna, dammit. I had to—”

Petal smacked the gun against his face. Such a rash action against the man she used to love like a father hurt more than it’d ever hurt him. She felt like she crossed a line. “Tell me!” She already hated herself for striking him, but the question was an itch she needed to scratch. She needed to trust him again. He was her only constant.

He bowed his head, sighed deeply. “We had to make sure Gerry got to Seca directly, and you were supposed to have stayed in the cell. Stayed safe. The guard I dealt with was an insider who Enna had been working on. He was gonna get both of ya up to The Family. But ya had to go and kill him and escape. The idea was that while Gerry would deal with Seca, you’d be safe from his crazy followers. They’d have butchered ya both as soon as ya got in. We couldn’t afford for that to happen. Ya would’ve both walked into a death trap.”

“Why Gabe? Why The Family?”

“Gerry
is
one of The Family! He’s one of their sons. They promised Enna they would keep you safe!”

“From what?”

“From ya self, dammit!”

Petal dropped the weapon, stared at Gabe’s face. “What do you mean exactly?”

The sound of voices and a crash from outside made Gabe turn his back and frantically enter commands into the console. “Just go. Get to those coordinates and everything will make sense. For God’s sake, girl, trust me, yeah?”

“What’s out there? At these coordinates?”

“Ya home. Ya makers. Criborg.”

“One more thing. Natalya mentioned something happening in three days, what is it?”

“A war.”

Gabe pushed her through the door and closed it behind her. Petal stood trembling inside the dark tunnel. Her head buzzed with everything Gabe had said, and didn’t say. She wanted to go back, get more answers, but beyond the door she heard him scream, ‘run.’

So she ran.

Chapter 2

G
erry gripped his head and screamed a silent, torturous scream. A pulse of electricity ripped through his mind, stripping through the layers of security protecting his various internal systems. An insidious force probed at his mind, eating his memories.

Somewhere, out there, in the dark depths of space, an entity, a digital being had found Gerry. Snatched him up in its binary tendrils like a gargantuan squid. Gerry’s brain felt like it would burst into flames at any moment under the attack. And the worst thing: he could do nothing about it. Whatever this thing was had completely incapacitated Mags, his AIA, and also the system controlling the shuttle that still hurtled away from the earth and out into the deep reaches of space.

With his heart pounding against his chest and sweat dripping from his forehead and neck, Gerry tried to collect his thoughts and push away the rising panic. Only with logical thought could he... What exactly? Fight back? This thing attacking him had no centre. It didn’t respond to Gerry’s shouts or thoughts, it just wanted whatever Gerry held within his mind, but for what purpose?

“What do you want?” Gerry screamed, his voice finally sounding within the tight confines of the shuttle. The scream sounded muffled, distorted. All his senses had diminished under the attack as if his brain had tried to divert energy and resources to defend against the attack.

Gerry clenched his eyes as another pulse ripped through him, but this time he paid attention and sent his consciousness further into the nano network Jachz had repaired.

There he caught a glimpse of the data flowing to and from his attacker.

It resembled Helix++ code but had mutated to something entirely alien, something unlike anything he had seen before. It twisted into new forms, always shifting. Its logic spun around a vortex that funnelled up data and memories from Gerry’s brain like a tornado.

Gerry sent his mind into it, focused as much power he could muster and conjured an attack program to break through the data-twister and destroy its connection. The program flew out into his network, but the entity saw it coming and swatted it away like it was nothing more than a bug.

Curiously, Gerry noticed that although his quick program had not damaged the entity, it did elicit a change in its behaviour. Seemingly satisfied with plundering Gerry’s brain it backed off, taking pieces of code from Gerry’s internal operating system with it—pieces put there by The Family to tap into Gerry’s new prosthetic eye in order to receive a video feed of everything he saw. As quickly as it came upon him, it receded. Gerry rushed a suite of security programs into his network and chased the entity out, closing any vulnerable areas as it retreated. Gerry still couldn’t get an accurate picture of what this thing was or where it had come from.

The thing scrambled its exit, making it impossible for Gerry to track where it came from. But as it left his mind fully, he heard the static buzz of his systems reconnecting to the network within the shuttle that connected him to Jachz and The Family.

It was the first time he ever felt thankful for that. His head still throbbed with pain and his vision hadn’t returned to its usual sharpness, but at least now he could work his hands and locate the shuttle’s navigation controls. He spun it round and pointed the nose back to the space station.

“Gerry, can you hear me? Please respond.” The controlled, artificial voice of Jachz, Gerry’s recovery manager and The Family’s most prized autonomous AI, called to him over the communications channel.

“I’m here, Jachz,” Gerry said between deep breaths. “What the hell happened?”

“We lost connection,” Jachz said, a slight clip of concern to his usually collected voice. “I believe something blocked us. We experienced a complete blackout, communications speaking.”

“Remember that thing I said I saw back in your lab? The thing in my brain?”

“I do. I couldn’t find anything during the scan. It was just a glitch.”

“Some glitch,” Gerry said. “The damned thing near mind-raped me.” He didn’t tell Jachz that it also damaged the software that connected Gerry to The Family. Already his own efforts to continue to pick away at the security had fared better than his previous attempts while on the station. Despite the terrible pain in his head that felt like someone had smashed him about the skull with a sledgehammer, he was at least grateful to the entity for creating a chink in the armour of The Family’s software. Whatever had happened, one thing for sure was when he got to the surface of Earth, he didn’t want them seeing or hearing what he was up to.

He’d find Petal and keep her safe—from everyone, including The Family.

“I can’t detect anything on the various networks,” Jachz said.

“You won’t, Gerry replied, sighing quietly to himself as he saw Earth hove into view. The thought of flying out into the solar system indefinitely had scared him more than the idea of his mind being opened like a can of tuna. “It covered its tracks. It’s way more advanced than anything I’ve seen before. It...” Gerry trailed off, not wanting to give too much away.

“Go on,” Jachz prompted. “I’m worried about this. I think you ought to come back to the station so we can examine you again.”

“No way in hell, Jachz, old buddy. No offense. I enjoy your company to a degree, but space and me don’t get on. I want gravity and an atmosphere, and I’d appreciate it if you could help me get back there.”

He seemed to wait for a while. Gerry wondered if he was clearing it with Amma or Nolan—his parents, or perhaps the sneering, jealous Tyronius. Jachz came back to him. “Okay, Gerry, I’m uploading new flight instructions to the shuttle’s navigation computer. Just relax and let me know if anything odd happens. I’ll guide you through as you get closer.”

“Thanks, Jachz.”

Gerry sat back and stretched his legs to ease the tension in his muscles. A welcome sight in front of him filled the holoscreen of the shuttle and he felt himself finally relax and banish the image of that great digital beast feasting on his mind.

A blue pearl spinning on a blanket of black velvet grew larger as the background stars receded from view. The Earth filled Gerry’s shuttle screen. Faint forces vibrated through the hull. The shuttle’s thrusters adjusted his trajectory.

From 380 km, he started his descent. He’d spent the last two weeks up there in The Family’s gigantic low-earth-orbit space station, now more than 100 km behind him, looking down at the blue marble wondering about her, about Petal. Was she still alive, was she suffering?

The numbers ticked down on his augmented visual overlay. It had taken Gerry only a few days to appreciate his new visual upgrade: an optical prosthesis to replace the eye Seca had gouged out.

“Adjusting speed of descent,” Jachz said.

“Roger that,” Gerry replied.

He prepared himself for entering the atmosphere. He dropped like a stone falling from outer space. His guts churned. Sweat dripped from his body into his space suit. His heart rate spiked, nearing his maximum. A red warning light flashed on his AO, his Augmented Overlay. Mags spoke to him directly in his mind.

—
Take slow deep breaths, Gerry, we’re nearly there. All is fine.

— Easy for you to say, Mags. You don’t have a fleshy body to burn up during re-entry.

— Well, we are one and the same thing,
Mags said, reminded Gerry of their integration.

The shuttle spun over, re-aligned to the correct path, and dropped into a thirty-degree angle.

Gerry closed his eyes hoping to avoid the nauseating feeling of seeing Earth and space and all that is in it spin around him.

“Entering the atmosphere, Gerry,” Jachz said. “You’ll rendezvous with the City’s docking unit in T-20 minutes.”

“Thanks, Jachz.”

The AI’s laugh resembled a small child’s: innocent and high-pitched. It made Gerry wonder if it wouldn’t be better for AI constructs like Jachz to stay away from Earth, stay within the safe confines of the space station. Away from fighting, pain, disappointment. They had a deeply serene nature to them. The tech integrated in them: the AIAs, the augmentations, hormonal balance controllers, and perceptive feedback enhancers, seemed to not only improved them as people, but evolved their outlook, too, despite their lack of real world knowledge and understanding. Perhaps that lack of knowledge gave them a new insight, one that wasn’t poisoned by humanity’s view of the universe.

“If you ever come down from your nest, I hope you find this easier than I do,” Gerry said.

“Maybe one day I’ll get to see your world, Gerry.”

“On second thoughts, you’re probably better off staying where you are.”

“Oh, why do you say that?”

“It’s bad news down here, Jachz, real bad news.”

“I see.”

Gerry detected a hint of disappointment Jachz’s voice. Normally Gerry wouldn’t have noticed, but since his own upgrades, he’d become more perceptive than before. Mags, his AIA, had undergone a series of new software-enhancements, integrating closer within his unique brain and the secondary neural network.

The craft shook, pulled Gerry from his philosophical thoughts. His AO streamed with speeds, velocity vectors, temperatures, and heart rate; the latter two spiking.

He tensed the muscles in his legs, pushing himself back into his seat, his hands gripping the holds attached either side of him and he tried to hide the thoughts of burning up into a fiery ball of death.

“Hey, Jachz, buddy? Holy hell! Is this normal?” Gerry said.

The shuttle rocked violently. The temperatures continued to rise.

“You’re doing fine. Just breathe and relax.”

“Relax. Yeah, that’s good. Stay calm and relax. Oh hell, I’m going to die in this tub aren’t I? It’s too hot. The shuttle can’t take it, surely.”

“It’s within tolerances. You’re doing well. You’ll be through it any second now.”

Gerry’s stomach lurched. He leant forward, vomited into an open vacuum bin, which ensured no particulate remained within the cabin. His head throbbed. His body became damp with panic sweat. But when he raised his head and looked out of the cabin window, there in the distance, the reflective surface of the Dome shined like a welcoming beacon.

“You’re through, Gerry. Engaging landing protocol.”

“Well, that’s something I never want to do again,” Gerry said between deep breaths.

“Apparently you get used to it. Or so I’m told,” Jachz replied. “You can activate your Earth surface protocols now.”

He referred to Gerry’s new personal scanning and recording systems. Through his optical prosthesis, Amma, Nolan, and the rest of the analysts would see what he sees, then use that information to plan their strategies. The first thing on
his
agenda, besides finding Petal, was severing that connection—which since his attack was now an easier proposition, though he did wonder if the attack had left him vulnerable.

Even now, approaching Earth, he still felt a buzz of fear in his mind as if that great black thing had left a part of itself inside his brain.

The shuttle flew within the Earth’s atmosphere as it sped westwards toward the Dome. A glint of morning sunlight reflected off the surface: a tiny spark on the dawn horizon. With the sun at his back, the shuttle began to slow and dip beneath the clouds.

For the first time, Gerry got an overview of the devastation. From his altitude he saw great acres of dark land, scorched by the nuclear bombs. Cities lay like children’s building bricks. What used to be farms were now dead, poisoned lands, and rivers moved slowly, filled with radioactive sludge.

Now over the border between the Empire of China and the Republic of Mongolia, the location of the Dome, he saw how the devastation affected the forests. Although it was June and in the middle of spring, there were still no leaves or greenery. Even now, over forty years since those fatal bombs fell, the nuclear winter still had the seasons within its cold grasp.

Gerry closed his eyes, not wanting to see anymore of the rubble, or the dead, empty, charred buildings that used to be home to tens of millions of people. He wondered what had happened to all the bodies. Had their bones vaporised and got sucked up into the atmosphere only to rain down later in the fallout? Or were they still there, buried under Steelcrete tombs?

No matter the circumstances of the war, he found it difficult to side with The Family’s justification for ending it like this.
It was more than war they ended
, he thought.
It was nearly everything
. So much loss and grief.

“Approaching the Dome, Gerry,” Jachz said, breaking Gerry from his thoughts. He was thankful for the interruption. Anger built within him at the scenes below. He reminded himself that finding Petal, if she was still alive, was his number one priority. Anything else would have to come later.

The Dome loomed large in his shuttle’s windows. It looked like a giant blister on the skin of the earth. Semi-translucent, he could only make out blurs and a few colours inside.

A panel within the Dome slid back into the architecture, giving him access to the landing zone below. He’d often watch them land from his office at Cemprom, the tower across a field from there. Gerry thought back to a few weeks before all the madness had started. He’d never thought he’d find himself in a shuttle returning from the station.

The Dome’s landing zone was two clicks away. He came in slow and steady. The shuttle’s auto-piloting system managing the speed and angles perfectly. The access area loomed into view, and he finally let his muscles relax. Despite what had gone in, it still felt like returning home, or at least more like home than the station.

The shuttle reduced its speed, engaged its VTOL, Vertical Take Off and Lift engines, and settled down on a Steelcrete landing pad.

He sat up, took a deep breath, and waited for the nausea to pass.

***

Gerry eased out of the cockpit, pushed the door up and over his head. On shaky legs he made his way down the ladder to the landing pad. Rows of similar shuttles were lined up next to his. Behind the landing pad, looming into the air, the control tower stood like a great mushroom with its indomitable grey tube and wide flat dish on top. The morning sun, still rising from the east, shone on the tower, casting long shadows over the low, flat-roofed buildings that made up the offices of the city’s aviation centre.