Cyber Dawn (A Ben Raine Novel) (3 page)

“Megan, what’s going on?” I finally asked.

“Sorry for the excitement,” she said. “I just had to get you out of there or you’d never make your exam. If we’d gone through the main building security station, they wouldn’t have let you leave.”

“Why not?” I asked.

“Fire drill. Until the head count is finished, no one leaves.”

“I guess that makes sense,” I replied, not convinced. It seemed like an awful lot of effort just to make a midterm exam on time.

“So, about your system update,” she said, changing the subject. “I need to finish that.”

“When you get back?”

“You know me, Ben. I’ll go crazy on vacation knowing I left something unfinished.”

I laughed. A few months after we’d met, Megan had gone home to Ohio for the holidays. She called, texted and emailed me a hundred times to make sure everything was okay.

“Maybe you could come over after school,” she said. “Probably won’t take more than an hour or two.”

Returning to CyberLife after school was the last thing I wanted to do. Even if it meant seeing Megan. I needed to study for my Tuesday midterms and, if I failed to avoid the football team during the day, tend to a few bruises. “Sure, why not,” I replied half-heartedly.

“Great. I’ll text you my address.”

Confused, I stopped and looked at her. “Your . . . address?”

She grinned. “Sure. But don’t be all weird about it. I’m not hitting on you.”

“Uh, hitting on me . . . what . . . Megan,” I said, fumbling my words.

Real smooth, Ben.

She punched me lightly on the shoulder. “Just teasing. I’ll order a pizza. It’ll be fun.”

A million questions formed in my mind, including how she could justify connecting to my system at home after just giving me her NDA speech. But in the end, it didn’t matter. Megan could invite me over for a root canal and I’d still be happy about it.

“Okay,” I said with a shrug, trying to act like it was no big deal. In my chest, my heart pounded. “I could be there around four.”

“Great, it’s a date,” she said.

We walked for a half-minute in silence before Megan spoke again. “Hey, this Katherine Nickel isn’t going to be jealous, is she?”

I groaned. “No.”

“She pretty?”

“Very.”

“That didn’t take long, Benjamin,” she said. “You’ve only been in school for two months.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“So when’s the date?”

“Probably never.”

“But you said . . .”

“Was supposed to be Saturday night,” I replied. “The homecoming dance.”

After a pause, Megan said, “Ah, because of the game?”

“Yeah. Bad for her reputation I guess.”

Megan gently rubbed my back as we walked. “Sorry to hear that, Benjamin. Her loss though, right?”

I shrugged. Katherine had no shortage of guys lining up to date her.
She probably had a new date to the dance ten seconds after she dumped me,
I thought.

It wasn’t until we rounded the back corner of the CyberLife headquarters building that I realized where we were headed. Twenty yards away was the rear pedestrian gate, guarded by a man wearing black body armor. Over his shoulder, I could see the gate was closed and locked down.

Before I could warn Megan, she called to the guard, “Hey, Scott!”

“Hi, Ms. Reynolds,” the guard replied as we walked up. “What are you doing back here? This gate is closed.”

She nodded in my direction. “We were outside experimenting with some changes to his system. When the alarm went off, we couldn’t get back into the building. Ben needs to leave, so we came here.”

“Unfortunately,” Scott said. “I can’t let him leave.”

Megan tilted her head, smiled, and tucked a loose strand of hair over her ear. “Oh, come on, Scott. He’s got an exam in like twenty minutes. You don’t want him to fail math class, do you?”

I’d seen Megan turn on the charm many times over the years—head tilt and hair tuck being her best move. It never failed.

This time included.

The guard glanced at me. I shrugged, doing my best to play along.

“All right, Megan, he can go,” the guard said. “But I’ll have to manually scan him. This gate’s automated system isn’t online yet today.” He nodded in the direction of the walk-through scanning station built into the brick wall.

“No problem,” I said.

The rear exit, like every exit at the CyberLife headquarters, was protected by a sophisticated scanning system designed to check for data storage devices. Merrick was fanatical about data security, to the point where he didn’t allow unauthorized storage devices to enter or exit the building. I’d been scanned more times than I could count.

Scott pulled a small, handheld scanner off his belt and approached. After running it over my front and back, he said. “All right, he’s good.”

The guard stepped back into the small guardhouse. The gate swung open.

“Four o’clock?” Megan whispered to me.

“Sounds good,” I replied. “See you then.”

I walked through the exit and began to jog toward the main visitor parking lot. Three minutes later, as I climbed into my Jeep and started it up, I noticed something odd about the front of the building. There weren’t any employees standing around waiting to be let back in.

And there definitely weren’t any fire trucks.

4

Even with her help escaping the CyberLife headquarters, I’d still been ten minutes late for my first exam of the week. On top of that, the school rumor mill was already in overdrive from the past weekend’s events. Rumors of Katherine ditching me, and the football team’s desire to kick my ass, flowed freely. On Friday before the game, every other person in the hallway gave me a high five. Now, all I got were conspiratorial whispers and the occasional “jerk” comment.

With a deep sigh, I flipped through my history e-book and stopped on a random page. At the front of the room, Mrs. Bradley droned on about the Battle of Stirling in 1297. She alternated between reading facts from her printed version of the e-book and writing on the chalkboard (yes, the chalkboard—the only one still used in the entire school, maybe the planet). I tuned her out and focused on the one thing I couldn’t keep my mind off of: Megan.

Other than a chance meeting at a coffee shop a few weeks before, I’d never seen her outside of CyberLife. She seemed to spend all of her time at work. I was looking forward to getting to know a different side of her. I’d known Megan for a couple of years—since she’d been assigned to be my cybernetic systems tech. We’d hit it off from day one. Conversation was easy between us and we spent most of our long hours together laughing and teasing each other. Over time, my feelings for her grew . . .
complicated
.

My mind wandered back to the conversation we’d had earlier in the day. Even though she’d been angry and somewhat unsympathetic to my side of things, it felt good to open up to her. For years after my first surgery, hiding the truth had been the fun part. I pretended to be a superhero, ready to covertly save the day like Clark Kent or Bruce Wayne. Now, in high school, the game wasn’t fun anymore. I was just lying, plain and simple. To my coaches, teachers, friends, girlfriends and everyone else.

Perspective, Ben
, I reminded myself.
It’s all about perspective.

I looked around the room and counted classmates with cybernetic augments. Fourteen total. Half the class. Most were corrective eye augments, easily identified by a small metallic connection port on the left or right temple. One girl, Claire, had a cybernetic hand. Officially, she was injured in a car accident. But the rumor was that she voluntarily had her hand removed to become an elite piano player. I didn’t know which was true, but there was no denying she was really good at playing the piano.

I stared at Claire’s silver and black metallic hand and felt a pang of jealousy that she didn’t need to cover it. No need to lie to her friends or anyone else. I smiled at the thought, which ended up being a really bad idea.

“Mr. Raine, since you seem so happy this afternoon,” a voice boomed from across the room. “Can you tell me in what year William Wallace died?”

I locked eyes with a frowning Mrs. Bradley, my history teacher. She was tall and thin and wore an old purple cardigan sweater. Her gray hair was up in a bun, and a pair of metal-rimmed glasses dangled on the end of her long nose.

“Um . . . yeah . . . sure,” I said. Sitting up straight, I glanced around the room, hoping for a little help. Unfortunately, the only student even looking my way was Holly Brennan, resident history nerd and teacher’s pet. Everyone else had his or her eyes glued to a desk.

Next to me, my friend Mason Parker was trying to stifle a laugh. I glared at him and shook my head, knowing he had no idea when Wallace died either.

“Take your time, Mr. Raine,” said Bradley. “We have
all
afternoon.”

The class groaned.

My phone buzzed in my pocket. For a split second, I wondered if someone was trying to bail me out, if only to get class dismissed on time. But that idea quickly faded. Nobody was dumb enough to risk getting caught with a phone in Mrs. Bradley’s class. Especially not to bail out public enemy number one.

Several classmates whispered for me to hurry up. I didn’t know the answer, of course. I also didn’t think it was fair that my multi-billion-dollar cybernetic brain couldn’t be programmed to recall useless history facts. Or for that matter, access the Internet so I could look them up. I made a mental note to ask Megan about it when I saw her in twenty minutes.

Deciding a wild guess was likely worse than keeping my mouth shut, I looked at Mrs. Bradley and shrugged my shoulders. Her eyes narrowed as she slowly shook her head. To nobody’s surprise, and everybody’s relief, she called on Holly next.

“1305,” answered Holly, a triumphant smile on her face.

“That’s correct, Ms. Brennan,” Bradley replied.

Before she could call on another victim, the bell rang three times, signaling the end of the school day. Like everyone else in class, I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone. My lips curled into a huge smile as I read the message from Megan.

Still on for 4? 1253 Terrace Lake Road #412. Door code is 1473.

“Okay students,” called Mrs. Bradley over the chatter. “Don’t forget Wednesday’s exam.”

More groans.

“And, Mr. Raine, please see me before you leave.”

The groans turned into a collective, “
oooo
.”

My smile flipped to a frown.

“Good luck,” Mason said as he ran to the door.

“Thanks,” I grumbled.

I grabbed my bag and jacket off the floor and walked to the front of the room. I hoped whatever it was would be quick. Holly still sat at her desk in the front row. She had bright red hair, green eyes, and an overly sarcastic smile. Whatever Bradley wanted, Holly was in on it.

“Mr. Raine,” Bradley said as I stepped in front of her desk. “Did you know that I’ve been to every school football game—home and away—for the past fifteen years?”

Oh crap.

“No, ma’am,” I answered. “I didn’t know.”

Bradley stared at me for several seconds, then picked a piece of paper up off her desk. “You are perilously close to failing this class. If you don’t get better than a C on Wednesday’s test, you
will
not pass.”

“I haven’t been doing
that
bad,” I replied. “Have I?”

She lifted the paper to her nose. With pursed lips, she rattled off my previous test and quiz grades. Lots of
D’s
mixed in with a few
C-’s
.

I thought about arguing the merits of her testing style. Memorizing random facts for multiple-choice tests was not the way I preferred to learn. But a quick glance at the wall clock reminded me that priority number one was getting out of there. Instead of arguing, I chose diplomacy. “I’ll study tonight, Mrs. Bradley,” I said. “I promise. I don’t want to fail your class.”

“No, Mr. Raine, I’m afraid that is not good enough.”

She dropped the sheet of paper on her desk and sighed heavily. “I realize you’re new at this school, so I’m going to help you out.” She glanced at Holly and nodded. “Ms. Brennan here will tutor you. She’ll make sure you’re ready for the exam.”

My mouth fell open as I turned to look at Holly. She stared back, a smug expression on her face.

“Happy to help, Mrs. Bradley,” she said.

All the formality was about to make me puke.
Mr. Raine. Mrs. Bradley. Ms. Brennan.

Ugh.

I knew there was no way out of it. But as long as the tutoring happened
after
Megan’s, I didn’t care. After my terrible weekend, surviving an hour or two with Holly would be a piece of cake.

“Thanks, Mrs. Bradley. I appreciate the help.” Turning to face Holly, I said, “How does tomorrow before school sound? We can meet in the library.”

Holly grinned. “Sure, that’s fine.”

I breathed a sigh of relief.

“No, Mr. Raine, I’m afraid that
won’t
work,” Bradley said, shaking her head. “You two will study now. Here, in this classroom.”

“I–I can’t right now,” I sputtered. “I have a . . . doctor’s appointment.”

“I don’t think so, Mr. Raine,” Bradley said with an evil grin. “It’s a little late in the day for a doctor’s appointment, don’t you think?”

My shoulders sank and I silently cursed myself for the terrible excuse. I lifted my phone to type Megan a short message that I’d be late. Before I could hit send, Mrs. Bradley reached out with a long bony hand and snatched the phone away.

“You know the rules, Mr. Raine,” she barked. “No phones in my classroom.”

“Hey, what the . . .” I protested. “Class is over.”

“Not for you it’s not. Rules are rules.”

“But . . .”

She signaled
stop
with her hand. “I’ll take good care of your precious phone. You can pick it up in my office after you’re done.”